Harry Potter: Pursuit of Power
by sattilallu
Summary: What happens when an act of desperation by Lord Voldemort ends up giving Harry the tools necessary to engineer his enemies's downfall. AU from the end of OOTP. Dark!Harry. Skilled!Harry.
1. Chapter 1: Metamorphosis

**Harry Potter: Pursuit of Power**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

**Chapter 1. Metamorphosis**

**11:30 PM **

**18****th**** June 1996**

**The Ministry of Magic – Atrium**

_Sure it was over, sure Voldemort had decided to flee, Harry made to run out from behind his statue guard, but Dumbledore bellowed:_

_ "Stay where you are, Harry!" _

_For the first time, Dumbledore sounded frightened. Harry could not see why: the hall was quite empty but for themselves, the sobbing Bellatrix still trapped under the witch statue, and the baby phoenix Fawkes croaking feebly on the floor_

_And then Harry's scar burst open and he knew he was dead: it was pain beyond imagining, pain past endurance._

_He was gone from the hall, he was locked in the coils of a creature with red eyes, so tightly bound that Harry did not know where his body ended and the creature's began: they were fused together, bound by pain, and there was no escape _

_And when the creature spoke, it used Harry's mouth, so that in his agony he felt his jaw move _

"_Kill me now, Dumbledore…"_

_Blinded and dying, every part of him screaming for release, Harry felt the creature use him again… _

"_If death is nothing, Dumbledore, kill the boy…" _

_Let the pain stop, thought Harry… let him kill us… end it, Dumbledore… death is nothing compared to this… _

_And I'll see Sirius again… _

_And as Harry's heart filled with emotion, the creature's coils loosened…._

_- excerpt from Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix_

… and the creature desperate to regain its slipping control reached out blindly to the magic that forged a connection between itself and its victim almost fifteen years ago hoping to gain another foothold in the boys mind, not knowing that the lightning bolt scar which stood as a symbol of its greatest failure to date contained more than just magic. So mangled was the creature's soul that it could no longer recognize a piece of itself underneath the agony caused by trying to possess Harry Potter. But the pain became unbearable before it could gain control of the connection that existed between itself and the boy and it was repelled from the boy's body. The creature did not know then that its act of desperation had set in motion a small chain of events that would end with giving Harry Potter the tools to engineer its downfall.

**01:00 AM**

**19****th**** June 1996**

**Hogwarts – Headmaster's Office**

_Harry closed his eyes. If he had not gone to save Sirius, Sirius would not have died… More to _

_stave off the moment when he would have to think of Sirius again, Harry asked, without caring _

_much about the answer, "The end of the prophecy... it was something about neither... can live..." _

"… _while the other survives," said Dumbledore._

"_So," said Harry, dredging up the words from what felt like a deep well of despair inside him, _

"_so does that mean that… that one of us has got to kill the other one… in the end?" _

"_Yes," said Dumbledore. _

_For a long time, neither of them spoke. Somewhere far beyond the office walls, Harry could hear _

_the sound of voices, students heading down to the Great Hall for an early breakfast, perhaps. It _

_seemed impossible that there could be people in the world who still desired food, who laughed, _

_who neither knew nor cared that Sirius Black was gone forever. Sirius seemed a million miles _

_away already; even now a part of Harry still believed that if he had only pulled back that veil, he _

_would have found Sirius looking back at him, greeting him, perhaps, with his laugh like a bark… _

"_I feel I owe you another explanation, Harry," said Dumbledore hesitantly. "You may, perhaps, _

_have wondered why I never chose you as a prefect? I must confess… that I rather thought… you _

_had enough responsibility to be going on with." _

_Harry looked up at him and saw a tear trickling down Dumbledore's face into his long silver __beard._

_- excerpt from Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix_

As Harry climbed down the staircase which led to Dumbledore's office, the cocktail of emotion and adrenaline that had kept him going for the past few hours died down and gave way to a bone deep wariness. His scar which had mercifully remained painless since he repelled Voldemort's possession had started throbbing again, albeit in a different way than before. The pain he had previously experienced from his scar had been localized around the scar though varying in magnitude from tiny pin pricks to being stabbed in the head with a hot poker. But now he felt as if something vast and incomprehensible is spreading out from his scar to smother him. For a brief instant he considered going back to Dumbledore's office but dismissed the thought as soon as it occurred to him. He wasn't in the mood to meet with the headmaster so soon after their talk. He wanted to rest in a place where he wouldn't be disturbed.

Before he knew it his feet had carried him to the room of requirement. He paced in front of the wall three times while thinking of a place where he would be able to rest and not be found by anybody. The room provided him with a comfortable bedroom with a décor similar to the Gryffindor dormitories. Harry closed the door behind him and collapsed on the bed and within a few minutes gave in to the smothering darkness which had been steadily encroaching upon his mind since the failed possession and which he mistakenly assumed was exhaustion, not knowing that his actions since leaving Dumbledore's office were not entirely his own or that he had just started the hardest and most important struggle of his life.

**01:20 AM**

**19****th**** June 1996**

**Hogwarts – Room of Requirement.**

Almost fifteen years ago when the creature known as Lord Voldemort was struck by a rebound killing curse, a tiny piece of his mangled soul split apart from the rest and without an adequate vessel for its storage would have perished. But by a stroke of fortune it managed to find remnants of its master's magic in the lightning bolt scar on Harry Potter's forehead and managed to find a home in the scar. But the soul fragment was not willingly separated from its owner and the scar was not a properly enchanted vessel and hence despite possessing all the memories of Lord Voldemort from his birth to the moment it was created, it had no cognizance and none of the other characters shared by its brethren except for a tenuous connection to the original. So it had remained dormant while unconsciously sustaining its existence by continuously leeching a little magic from its host and imbuing a few of its powers to said host. It had been kept weak and at bay by the protection its host's mother had woven into not just his blood but his very soul by the act of ultimate sacrifice. But since Lord Voldemort's resurrection it had started gaining strength and when he tried to use the piece of soul as a foothold to possess its host, it gained even more strength and more importantly the brief but intimate contact with another part of itself has gifted it with true cognizance. The part of Lord Voldemort which existed in Harry Potter had, for the first time in its existence, achieved a sense of self beyond the most basic instinct of survival. This made the soul fragment even more similar to a true horcrux and as is the nature of such existence it had started to influence its host with the ultimate goal of subjugating and possessing him.

The accidental horcrux immediately spread the insidious tentacles of its influence on its host's mind. When the boy felt something wrong and thought to seek help from his headmaster it used his emotional trauma and physical exhaustion and subtly planted thoughts in his mind to make the option seem unappealing and made him isolate himself from any external influence in the room of requirement and once he was alone it attacked with all its strength to achieve its goal.

But before the horcrux could take over the host's body it had to overcome the protection weaved upon him by his mother, a Sentinel whose sole purpose was to protect Harry Potter's mind, body and soul from all harm. The nature of this sentinel was in many ways the polar opposite of a horcrux, as a horcrux was created by splitting one's soul in an attempt to escape death while the sentinel was a construct created by the sacrifice of Lily Potter's life, magic and her very soul for a single purpose. It had a limited form of cognizance in that it could detect and understand any threat to its host and respond accordingly by utilizing and molding its' host's magic into a form that would defeat the threat as it had before when quirinius quirrell had been rendered incapable of touching Harry Potter without being grievously harmed or much more recently when it had utilized Harry's overwhelming emotions to expel Lord Voldemort from his body.

And like before the Sentinel responded to the horcrux's attacks, however this battle unlike the previous ones was against a piece of soul which while comprising of only a fraction of a Lord Voldemort's power had all the skill and experience of the brilliant wizard and also an instinctual understanding of both Harry Potter and the Sentinel due to almost 15 years of proximity and the timing of the attack could not be worse as Harry's magic which was the fuel for the Sentinel's work was exhausted from his previous battle.

The Sentinel had, with the limited intelligence bestowed upon it had recognized this disadvantage and had deduced that it could not repel this attack by itself even while utilizing Harry's magic as the horcrux too with its increased cognizance had started leeching a higher amount of Harry's magic to do its bidding. So as a desperate act it wrenched Harry's consciousness from the depths of his mind and fused with it to extent it had never done before.

Heavily burdened by grief and exhaustion, Harry had until this point, only been peripherally aware of the Struggle between the two entities his body had been playing host to. But when the Sentinel fused with him he had instantly gained the knowledge which until then had only been available to the sentinel and became aware of the nature of his tenants and understood the consequences should the soul fragment succeed in its attempts. And so with every attempt the horcrux made to further spread its influence on its host's mind and magic, Harry guided by the Sentinel learned and evolved. He learned how to infiltrate the horcrux's mind and how to take control and utilize its own magic against it from its attempts against him and when it sought to protect its own slightly inferior supply of power, he learnt how to defend and purge his own magic from foreign influence and proceeded to do just that and while the horcrux was still reeling from being cut off from his magic, he gathered all the magic available to him and attacked it with the intent to shatter its newly gained cognizance. In this he had succeeded in that his attack shattered the horcrux's hastily assembled defenses and then using the horcrux's earlier tactic he sent several tendrils of his own power to infiltrate the horcrux's magic and started siphoning its own power to add to his own and when he once again gathered a sufficient amount of power, he sent an even stronger attack and this time he succeeded in piercing through the soul fragment's remaining defenses, and entered its mind and at once he was drowned in a deluge of foreign memories.

More than Five decades worth of memories belonging to the darkest wizard in recent memory assaulted Harry's mind with force of a freight train and seared themselves onto his brain. Yet, Harry whose will power and sense of self are stronger than they had ever been weathered the assault and had only become stronger for it. He gathered his magic one more time and with the Sentinels guidance molded it for a final assault, this time to completely expel the broken and mangled piece of Voldemort's soul from his body. And when he struck, the "horcrux" if it could even be called that anymore did not even put up a token defense as it exited his body and died an ignominious death. The only sign of its passing was a tiny puff of black smoke which exited the lightning bolt scar which adorned Harry's forehead and dispersed with a tiny scream.

**03:17 PM**

**19****th**** June 1996**

**Hogwarts – Room of Requirement**

It would not be a huge overstatement to say that the Harry Potter who woke up in the Room of Requirement was a markedly different person than the one who went to sleep almost fourteen hours ago. He woke up feeling well rested and also ridiculously hungry. But before he could procure any food, he needed to freshen up. As soon as the thought popped up into his mind a door appeared on the wall in front of him. A glance at his wrist watch showed that it was almost half past three. An absence of windows prevented him from finding out if it was afternoon or the dead of the night and once again like an omniscient god bent on fulfilling his every wish the room created a window on another wall letting in bright sunlight and giving him a beautiful view of the Hogwarts grounds. He got off the bed chuckling slightly and walked to the new door and opened it only to be greeted by an exact replica of the bathrooms on the Gryffindor tower.

He exited the bathroom half an hour later buck naked feeling (and probably smelling) much better than when he entered it. He needed to go to the Gryffindor tower to get and fresh change of clothes as his current ones were very dirty and he didn't want to traipse all the way to the kitchens in them. They were so dirty that even the normally gentle and eager to please elves would probably kick him out on principle. But, he didn't want to go the Gryffindor tower and face all his house mates either. So he thought it was time test a new spell.

He twirled his wand carefully in a complex motion and pointed it at his dirtiest sock and intoned

"_Mundis Vestimentum"_

He grinned as his sock twitched and shook itself as all the dirt on vanished from its surface. He quickly repeated the spell on all his articles of clothing and felt a surge of satisfaction as the spell worked perfectly every time. Maybe it was slightly pathetic that he was so pleased with a simple cleaning spell when Voldemort was well on his way to creating a horcrux at his age, but he couldn't help it. He had always felt the same whenever he had mastered a new spell regardless of its use and that part of him hadn't changed despite him possessing over 50 years of Voldemort's memories. He supposed that was a good thing. It was also slightly amusing that among the huge amount of spells and other assorted magicks he learnt from Voldemort, the first spell he needed was a simple cleaning spell. As he reviewed Voldemort's (and now also harry's) memories he was astonished at the sheer breadth of his knowledge. He had heard many times that the depth of Voldemort's knowledge of the dark arts was unparalleled. That much he now knew to be true. But the dark arts formed only a fraction(though a large fraction) of Voldemort's knowledge. Voldemort's mastery of more mundane magicks like transfiguration and charms was perhaps surpassed only Dumbledore in Great Britain. He also now knew exactly what set people like Voldemort and Dumbledore apart from other witches and wizards. He had heard the many wizards being praised as gifted or brilliant but both Voldemort and Dumbledore existed in a league of their own. Their powers were on a completely different plateau.

Voldemort had always possessed an intimate connection to his magic, intimate enough to allow him a remarkable amount of control long before he started at Hogwarts. And when he attended Hogwarts, he managed to learn and master new spells at an astounding rate. Harry always thought Hermione was a genius but even she paled in comparison to Voldemort. Voldemort had achieved a level of skill in his magic that he no longer required incantations and only required minimal wand movements for all except the most complex of spells.

Experiencing all of Voldemort's memories had left Harry with a cocktail of conflicting emotions. Admiration for his skill, tenacity and cunning, hatred for his actions against Harry and so many other innocent people and disgust that despite all the skill and knowledge he would let his hunger for immortality cripple his potential to such a large extent.

Horcruxes Harry thought, were a vile magic not just because of the actions necessary to create one but the act of splitting one's soul would cripple a person in ways that could not be adequately explained by words. Harry had a unique perspective on the nature of a horcrux. To date he had fought and destroyed two of those abominations, one of which was so uniquely entwined with his own magic that he doubted such a situation had ever occurred to anyone before. He had experienced the memories of a man whose mental state had degenerated with every horcrux he made. It was a testament to Voldemort's will power that he retained enough sanity and clarity of thought to make complex plans even after mangling his soul so badly.

But his flaws were also glaringly visible in that he was too easily controlled by his hatred. Despite all of Snape's proselytizing about Voldemort taking advantage of fools who wear emotions on their sleeves Harry thought that Voldemort was also one such fool though he had not always been so. When he was young Tom riddle had been much more in control of his emotions. While Voldemort as he currently was also exercised a remarkable amount of control normally, his control slipped much more frequently and for more petty reasons. Harry ascribed this change to Voldemort's horcruxes. Tearing a part of one's soul off creates an emptiness that could only be filled with powerful dark magic. Voldemort knew enough spells to utterly obliterate Harry in dozens of different ways, but every time Harry faced him Voldemort's first instinct was to use the killing curse. Harry had previously wondered why that was, after all while his mother's protection prevented Voldemort from killing him while using spells like the '_Avada Kedavra' _it didn't prevent him from say conjuring a rope and hanging Harry from it or conjuring enough water to drown him. He now knew that the Killing curse could if only temporarily fill the void in Voldemort's soul and dull the constant ache that Voldemort felt ever since making his first horcrux and which only grew with every new horcrux he made.

Even among the spells classified as dark magic, only a few created this curious effect, the cruciatus curse being another example, but none managed to dull the ache for as long as the killing curse. Voldemort had researched this phenomena mostly through trial and error and he found out that the more powerful the victim of the killing curse the longer the void was filled and the pain kept at bay. And so like a drug addict seeking his fill to get high on, Voldemort couldn't resist the temptation and hence reverted to throwing around killing curses whenever Harry was near.

Voldemort's memories also provided Harry with the knowledge to perform an adequate assessment of his own skills and potential. Harry could now honestly say that his skills and knowledge before gaining Voldemort's memories while better than most of his peers were still abysmal. They were not even comparable to a 16 year old Tom Riddle let alone 70 year old one. But Harry also recognized that he had a lot of potential, perhaps to one day even rival Voldemort himself.

Harry had been able to master the patronus charm and repel more than a hundred dementors when he was thirteen and had been able to best Voldemort in a contest of will power of magical power when he was fourteen. Of course Harry knew now that Voldemort having just been resurrected was not at the height of his powers but Harry too was exhausted from the third task of the triwizard tournament and had not yet grown into his full powers.

But Harry also recognized that his approach to his education was remarkably cavalier, especially for someone whose life was threatened enough times that he ought to have learned more than school yard spells. Voldemort had in his seven years at Hogwarts devoured any knowledge he could find at an astonishing pace while Harry himself had learned the barest minimum he could get away with. The only times he really applied himself were when he learned the patronus charm and during the tri-wizard tournament and both times it had been only to prevent himself from being embarrassed in front of a crowd than any real desire to improve himself. Even after Voldemort's resurrection Harry had spent an entire year moping around while bitching about Dumbledore and Umbridge and once again doing nothing to increase his skills. The only slightly useful thing he had done the whole year was teaching the DA the few spells he had mastered in the previous years. Though the fact that only five of them responded when called for help was pathetic and spoke of his nearly nonexistent charisma. Harry had now recognized that he had been far more desperate to live up to people's expectations of him than to really live. He was pretty sure now that if his mind didn't get dumped with Voldemort's memories he never would have found the desire to live up to his true potential.

Harry surmised that the glaring differences in both Tom's and his own attitude toward their education lay in their childhood. While at first glance, to an outside both of them would appear to have a similar childhood, both orphans with unhappy living conditions it couldn't be farther from the truth.

Tom was born in an orphanage in a country still reeling from the great depression and the First World War. The abundance of orphans created by the war and a scarcity of resources caused by the economic crisis had created a very Darwinian atmosphere in the orphanage. Tom had at an early age learned to be more sly and cunning to get better portions of food or better toys to play with. He learned to outsmart his fellow orphans and charm their minders. Most of his earlier accidental magic was caused in his attempts to escape from older and bigger bullies. He learned at a young age that whenever such strange events occurred the bullies would leave him alone for a while. So he learned to control these strange powers at first to protect himself and then to threaten other younger kids to do his bidding. What the other older kids did with their fists and legs he learned to do more efficiently with his powers and eventually made every other kid in the orphanage fear him. Young Tom had perhaps rightly so considered himself special. He had big dreams and bigger ambitions and so had also channeled his considerable mental faculties towards academic pursuits and consistently stood at the top of his class. But then he like so many other muggle-born and muggle-raised children had been blindsided by an invitation to Hogwarts. Learning of the existence of an entire world of people like him, of wizards and witches enraged and excited him in equal amounts. Enraged because he was told he was not as special as he thought himself to be and excited to learn more about his powers. On his arrival at Hogwarts he found himself placed in the Slytherin house where he had been treated with scorn and derision for his common muggle name. But Tom was always a fighter, he poured all his effort into proving himself to be superior to all those who mocked him. And at this he succeeded as within a few years he grew from his position as an outcast in his house to someone who was both admired and feared.

Harry on the other hand lived in an oppressive environment where he was discouraged from doing anything other than his assigned chores and keeping his head down. The Dursleys never encouraged him to do well at school. Any noteworthy academic achievement had been met with only indifference and scorn. And on the rare few occasions that he performed accidental magic he had been punished heavily. So Harry was used to coasting along at school and by the time he had come to Hogwarts the habit had become so ingrained that he was actually amazed that he remained an above average student.

Harry shook himself of from his rather lengthy musings a he finished dressing himself in his now clean clothes.

He pointed his wand at his hair and cast a hair grooming spell that Voldemort had funnily enough learned from Abraxas Malfoy when they were both in school. It took three iterations to get his hair into a decent looking mop, though Harry had no illusions getting it to stay that for long.

"_Postati Kameleon" _Harry muttered and tapped his wand on the top of his head and felt a cold tingle spread across his body as he successfully cast a disillusionment charm for the first time. As he exited the Room of Requirement, he checked himself and felt that his disillusionment charm though nowhere near the level of Voldemort's was as good as the one cast on him by Mad-Eye Moody. Voldemort himself was capable of turning himself almost completely invisible with a disillusionment charm. The mark of a good disillusionment charm was not only how well the charm mimics the background of the user but also how fast it adapts when a user is moving.

Voldemort was capable of a charm powerful enough to keep him completely invisible while running at his top speed. Harry may have a long way to go till he reached that level but he still felt that his first attempt was remarkably successful. Though it should be expected as Harry's knowledge of the spell was not just academic as he had memories of countless hours Voldemort spent mastering that spell. So he knew exactly how to mold his magic to get the best results. And as Harry attained better control over his magic his spells would inevitably improve.

As Harry moved along the corridors taking care to step out of the way of the occasional student he pondered on how to increase the control he had over his magic. The most commonly used method was practice. The more Harry practiced magic the better his control, but there were ways to speed up the process. Ritual magic is remarkably useful for such endeavors. It amazed Harry that very little was known about the nature of ritual magic to the general wizarding population. The prevailing opinion was that ritual magic was both dark and dangerous, which was true to an extent. Ritual magic was classified as dark because it was dangerous. Rituals are generally used to achieve results which are highly complex or powerful to achieve via normal spells. But when a spell is messed up the result usually varies with how powerful the spell was and how badly it was messed up. But for rituals of which even the simplest are more powerful than most spells even the slightest errors in the ritual circle can have disastrous and often fatal consequences for the user. So using ritual magic requires a large amount of study of the properties of the runes and the properties of the materials used to draw the runes and that was for using pre existing rituals. Designing rituals on the other hand required an even more extensive study and a knack for dangerous experimentation. So even highly accomplished wizards preferred using a series of overlapping spells achieve effects that could not be achieved by a single spell rather than dabbling in ritual magic. But ritual magic had some inherent advantages that could never be replicated by spells regardless of how many were used. It is well known among the academia that some of the oldest and longest lasting enchantments were cast using specially designed rituals.

And then there were rituals of the kind that Harry was pondering which were designed to help a wizard achieve his true potential. These rituals forcibly mold the user's magic in certain patterns (usually corresponding to individual wand movements) or a variety of elemental manipulations using the lowest amount of magic necessary while simultaneously letting the user feel the entire process intimately so that the user after performing the ritual a few times will then be able mold his magic in all the patterns with a high degree of finesse while reducing or even eliminating wand movements corresponding to the patterns. Voldemort had used these to help him achieve a seamless mastery of the molding patterns corresponding to all the commonly used wand movements and also to give himself a high degree of control over fire spells which eventually led to him being able master fiendfyre to an astonishing level. Harry needed both these rituals as mastering individual molding patterns would lead to an overall increase in his skill and he also needed to master fiendfyre to destroy Voldemort's remaining horcruxes when he obtained them.

Harry dissolved his disillusionment charm as he stopped in front of the portrait guarding the kitchens. He tickled the pear and the painting swung open and he entered the kitchen all the while planning his future.


	2. Chapter 2: Stratagem

**Harry Potter: Pursuit of Power**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

**Chapter 2. Stratagem**

"There you are Harry, I knew they would drag you into it somehow," Hermione said, breaking him out of his thoughts, as she lowered the paper.

Harry silently chastised himself. It was unwise to drift off too much in front of others. Though he doubted anyone would question him about it, considering what happened only a little more than a day ago, though to him, it felt as if it was a lifetime ago.

It was friday afternoon and Harry, Ginny, Neville, and Luna were visiting Ron and Hermione in the hospital wing. Harry was sitting at the foot of Ron's bed, barely paying attention as Hermione rattled on about something or another.

Ginny, Neville and Luna only had superficial injuries which were cured by Madame Pomfrey in a few minutes. Harry himself had gotten away with nothing more than a few scratches. Ron and Hermione on the other hand had more serious injuries.

Hermione had taken the _'Execratio Incido',_ a curse that manifested as a flaming slash that simultaneously cut and seeped the wound in magic that would hinder any efforts at healing, to the chest at a close range. Only the fact that Dolohov, the Death eater who cursed her, had been silenced beforehand had weakened the curse and probably saved her life. But she needed a lengthy potions regimen to fully heal and even then would be left with a scar. Harry thought having a scar as a reminder was good. It would hopefully serve as a reminder and instill caution that might one day save her life.

Ron on the other hand had tried to play with some brains that had been experimented on by the unspeakables while under the influence of a confundus charm. Aside from the cuts and scrapes that all of them sustained Ron also had dark welts where the tentacles constricted him. According to Madame Pomfrey the welts would heal as long as they were lathered regularly with a lotion she provided, but he had been kept under observation as nothing was known regarding the nature of those brains.

His friends were discussing the Daily Prophet article announcing the return of Voldemort. The Prophet had done an about face over night. The day before, he had been a lying and attention seeking loon. And today he was once again their hero, their boy-who-lived. The lone voice of truth who was forced to suffer slander and ridicule, while never wavering in his story, the article said. Of course, it didn't mention that they were the ones slandering and ridiculing him the whole time. He was honestly surprised that they hadn't yet come up with another hyphenated name for him.

Harry hadn't told any of his friends of what happened in the room with the archway and he no intention of doing it anytime soon. But since Hermione had resisted asking any questions, he suspected that Neville or one of the order members had already told them.

He doubted any of them could understand what he had been through. And he did not want any sympathy or pity. He had watched his godfather die, tried using the cruciatus, got possessed by a Dark Lord, and battled with a piece of said Dark Lord's soul for the ownership of his body with the help of a semi-sentient construct created by his mother's sacrifice and then had all the Dark Lord's memories downloaded into his mind, all in a span of twelve hours. No, he was sure that none of them could understand.

Then there was of course the prophecy. Dumbledore couldn't have picked a worse time to saddle him with that. But maybe that was the point. He suspected that Dumbledore wanted the prophecy to sink in just when he was guilty about Sirius's death. Dumbledore wanted Harry to accept Voldemort's defeat as his responsibility and the old headmaster was not above using Harry's guilt at the situation to help along the process. It was very subtle emotional manipulation, an area in which Dumbledore excelled at. And Harry would have fallen for it, had he not been, for the lack of better word, transformed by the fight against the horcrux.

His battle against the soul fragment and the subsequent memory dump had gifted him with a far better understanding of himself and his enemies. For the first time in his life he understood the nature of the war he been involved in since his birth. He had a much better understanding of the goals of all the relevant parties. He had lost the naïve and childish black and white view of the world he had previously held.

He knew Voldemort better than anyone else in the world. Probably better than the dark lord himself. The Dark Lord's memories, when viewed from his unique perspective, had revealed to him Voldemort's many strengths and few weaknesses.

He also now knew Dumbledore from Voldemort's perspective. Harry had always thought of Dumbledore as a wise and great protector. Even when he had been angry with Dumbledore, a part of him firmly believed that the venerable headmaster had his best interests at heart. He was pretty sure that was not the case now.

Voldemort had always been driven by a lust for power. He sought power for to prove himself better. He wanted to stand above all the others. To put it simply he wanted the world to be his to do with as he wished. He merely adopted the ideology of pureblood supremacy as a means to obtain powerful allies. It amused Voldemort greatly that the proud purebloods who had scorned him for his muggle heritage in school had later been the first ones to prostrate themselves before him and swear their allegiance. To him his allies and his stated ideology were merely tools to obtain more power.

Dumbledore on the other hand lived for his ideology. But his ideology was much more difficult to adequately define. From Voldemort's knowledge and experiences during the First war, Harry had inferred that Dumbledore was driven by a combination of a deep hatred of the Dark Arts and a desperate need to maintain the status quo of the wizarding world. Dumbledore truly believed that the magical world in its current state was best it could be. Despite singing platitudes about better rights for muggleborns and other marginalized groups like werewolves, he never utilized his enormous political power and his large network of allies to bring any real change.

Voldemort theorized that Dumbledore had a pathological fear for any large changes in the political and social order of the magical world, though he did not know the reason for this fear. It was this fear that prevented Dumbledore from taking any bold and decisive steps to curtail Voldemort's influence when he first started his grab for power. Sure Dumbledore created the Order of the Phoenix to fight Voldemort's Death eaters and used his allies to counter any moves made by Voldemort's followers in the political arena, but he could have made things a lot harder for Voldemort if he had used his power to support some overarching reforms that were proposed when Voldemort's grab for power was still in its infancy and his supporters few. But Dumbledore's distaste for change led him to scupper these proposals before they could really take root and in the process lose some powerful allies.

It was here that Dumbledore's ruthlessness shows itself. The reforms he blocked had the backing of some powerful pureblood families who opposed Voldemort as much as Dumbledore did, but had broken away from his influence when he refused to support their initiatives. They were also some of the most vocal opposition to Voldemort and hence had been targeted for elimination along with quite a few of Dumbledore's steadfast allies.

And of course the Dark Lord attacked them, sometimes succeeding and sometimes failing when he was stopped by Dumbledore and his order. But after some time Voldemort noticed a pattern, most of the attacks that succeeded were against families that had broken off from Dumbledore or had never actually supported him, while most of the failures were against Dumbledore's steadfast supporters. Families like the Bones' and McKinnons who were opposed to Dumbledore's policies were almost extinguished.

This pattern had confirmed two things that Voldemort had already suspected. One, Dumbledore had one or more spies among his followers and two; Dumbledore could be a ruthless opponent when it suited him. It had not taken a more alert Voldemort long to find the spies (there had been two). The Dark Lord had ruthlessly tortured and executed one to set an example while completely ignoring the other, lulling him into a false sense of security. Voldemort had then planned an attack on another of his opponents, the Potters, Harry's Grandparents, who were not particularly close to Dumbledore, and made sure to let the second spy know of it. It was a test, to confirm his suspicions about Dumbledore. He had six of his Death Eaters attack the potters while he personally led another attack on one of Dumbledore's closest allies simultaneously. Both of the attacks were a success, though Harry's grandparents had managed to kill four death eaters before they were taken down.

The results of the attacks pretty much confirmed Voldemort's theory. Dumbledore had despite having foreknowledge of his attacks had neither warned nor helped anyone who was not a steadfast ally. Voldemort's earlier attacks had ironically strengthened Dumbledore's position by eliminating the chief Warlock's political rivals while simultaneously pushing the general public and any remaining kin of his victims further into Dumbledore's influence. Indeed the murder of Charles Potter and his wife by Lord Voldemort had heavily contributed to Harry's parents joining the Order of the phoenix along with their friends, just as the deaths of James and Lily Potter had left Dumbledore as the only man who could decide Harry's fate.

While Harry had no proof that Dumbledore had foreknowledge of Pettigrew's duplicity and the switching of secret keepers, he would not be surprised if Dumbledore did know beforehand. Harry knew that Dumbledore was a legilimens whose skill was on par with if not greater that Voldemort's and the old man was not shy about using the skill even against his subordinates. Indeed Dumbledore, as the only person who had complete knowledge of the prophecy could have simply let the attack happen to put it in motion. If his gambit failed and Harry died, he had a spare in Neville after all. And Sirius's incarceration in Azkaban, without a trial had conveniently left Harry in Dumbledore's custody.

Another fact that supported Harry's suspicions that Dumbledore had, if not orchestrated, at least nudged certain pieces in to right places to create a setup that would put the prophecy in motion was the Sentinel. The Sentinel was a semi-sentient enchantment laid upon Harry by his mother to protect him from all danger. His brief but intimate contact with the sentinel during his battle with Voldemort's soul fragment had given him a deep understanding of its nature. He could still feel the sentinel inside himself, pulsing with comfortable warmth like a second heart beat.

It was so magnificent an enchantment that even with all of Voldemort's knowledge, he could not divine all the bits and pieces that went into its creation. He knew that it was not just an expression of his mother's will as Dumbledore had suggested before. The Sentinel was too precise and elegant for that. Harry suspected that a complex preparatory ritual with both himself and his mother had to be conducted to setup the enchantment and his mother's willing sacrifice of her life was the final ingredient necessary to give birth to the sentinel. And Harry, taking into consideration all of his own experiences and Voldemort's knowledge could honestly say that it was the greatest piece of magic he had ever seen. And therein lay the problem.

Harry had always been told that Lily Potter had been a brilliant witch and from Voldemort's few encounters with her, he knew that to be true. She was smart and brave. But she was only twenty one years old by the time of her death, only three years out of Hogwarts, most of which was spent fighting in a war and then pregnant and in hiding. Not enough time to achieve the expertise necessary to be dabbling with magicks of that level. Especially since she was a muggleborn and did not have access to special stores of knowledge that some very old and rich pureblood families tend to collect. The Potters despite being a very old family, were neither rich enough to acquire a ritual of such complexity nor were they known for having the expertise to create such rituals by themselves.

Dumbledore on the other hand had the money, the connections and the knowledge to either acquire it or possibly even modify an existing ritual himself. He had almost two years from the time he heard the prophecy to when Harry was marked. Enough time to acquire the knowledge (if he did not already possess it) and confer it on Harry's mother. All he had to was set up a situation where a worried mother would voice her fears for her son's life and hesitantly offer a piece of arcane knowledge that might help protect her son should her worst fears come to pass. And Dumbledore was an expert at creating such situations, carefully nudging his pawns into a certain course of his choosing while appearing to only help them realize what they thought were their choices.

Harry himself had experienced that particular talent of Dumbledore's a few times before. The first time of course had been the incident with the philosopher's stone. All the clues that Harry had come across all through his first year and the obstacles that seemed especially designed for Harry, Ron and Hermione were glaring clues and not even up to Dumbledore's usual standards. In fact Harry had known even then that Dumbledore had knowingly allowed Harry to face Voldemort. Dumbledore's true genius lie in the fact that instead of being horrified Harry had instead been appreciative and even thankful to Dumbledore for letting him face Voldemort. Even now Harry was not quite sure how he had come around to that particular thought process. And the various times he had foolishly risked his neck to do something or the other and every time felt grateful to Dumbledore for allowing him to get away with it never realizing that most of those 'adventures' were situations created by Dumbledore, some as tests and others as exercises to mold Harry to his liking.

And finally there was his scar, Harry was pretty sure that Dumbledore knew about his scar being a horcrux. Dumbledore most certainly knew that Voldemort dabbled in Horcruxes. Harry himself had practically offered the proof on a metaphorical silver platter when he presented the destroyed diary and explained in painful detail the way it functioned. There was no doubt in his mind that Dumbledore recognized it as a horcrux and tom's continued survival after its destruction would definitely clue him towards the existence of more horcruxes. Voldemort had indeed learned of the process of creating a horcrux from a book in the Hogwarts library and Harry would bet his entire vault that the book now probably existed under Dumbledore's personal protection.

All the times that Harry had complained about his scar hurting and the visions he had, Harry had been unknowingly providing more proof of himself being a horcrux. In hindsight Dumbledore had subtly alluded to his knowledge of Harry being a horcrux in a few of their previous conversations. But without the knowledge he now possessed he never would have connected the dots.

Harry had mastered rudimentary occlumency and legilimency with the sentinel's help in what was probably record time during his battle with the horcrux and had gained the knowledge of quite a few neat tricks that only an experienced legilimens could use. Mind magic was perhaps the only area of magic in which he was already on par with the likes of Dumbledore and Voldemort despite his lack of experience. And using the intense focus that an advanced occlumens is gifted with, Harry could recall those conversations like they happened yesterday.

"_Professor," he started again after a moment. "The Sorting Hat told me I'd — I'd have done well in Slytherin. Everyone thought I was Slytherin's heir for a while… because I can speak Parseltongue…" _

"_You can speak Parseltongue, Harry," said Dumbledore calmly, "because Lord Voldemort — who is the last remaining ancestor of Salazar Slytherin — can speak Parseltongue. Unless I'm much mistaken, he transferred some of his own powers to you the night he gave you that scar. Not something he intended to do, I'm sure…" _

"_Voldemort put a bit of himself in me?" Harry said, thunderstruck. _

"_It certainly seems so."_

_(Excerpt from Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets)_

"_How did you see this?" Dumbledore asked quietly, still not looking at Harry. _

"_Well… I don't know," said Harry, rather angrily - what did it matter? "Inside my head, I suppose -" _

"_You misunderstand me," said Dumbledore, still in the same calm tone. "I mean… can you _

_remember — er - where you were positioned as you watched this attack happen? Were you _

_perhaps standing beside the victim, or else looking down on the scene from above?" _

_This was such a curious question that Harry gaped at Dumbledore; it was almost as though he _

_knew… _

"_I was the snake," he said. "I saw it all from the snake's point of view."_

_(Excerpt from Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix)_

_Dumbledore now swooped down upon one of the fragile silver instruments whose function Harry _

_had never known, carried it over to his desk, sat down facing them again and tapped it gently _

_with the tip of his wand. _

_The instrument tinkled into life at once with rhythmic clinking noises. Tiny puffs of pale green _

_smoke issued from the minuscule silver tube at the top. Dumbledore watched the smoke closely, _

_his brow furrowed. After a few seconds, the tiny puffs became a steady stream of smoke that _

_thickened and coiled in the air… a serpent's head grew out of the end of it, opening its mouth wide. Harry wondered whether the instrument was confirming his story: he looked eagerly at Dumbledore for a sign that he was right, but Dumbledore did not look up. _

"_Naturally, naturally," murmured Dumbledore apparently to himself, still observing the stream of smoke without the slightest sign of surprise. "But in essence divided?" _

_Harry could make neither head nor tail of this question. The smoke serpent, however, split itself _

_instantly into two snakes, both coiling and undulating in the dark air. With a look of grim _

_satisfaction, Dumbledore gave the instrument another gentle tap with his wand: the clinking _

_noise slowed and died and the smoke serpents grew faint, became a formless haze and vanished. _

_(Excerpt from Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix)_

Dumbledore had known for years that Harry was Voldemort's horcrux and that he had been prophesied to be capable of defeating Voldemort. The only way to destroy a horcrux was to destroy the container. Voldemort's extensive research into this subject at Hogwarts and during his journeys to gain arcane knowledge from other dark mages had yielded no other methods. He doubted Dumbledore could come up with some other method. Dumbledore's reputation and connections may have availed him more avenues of research than Voldemort for most other magics, but dark magic is one area where Voldemort's knowledge and his connections to other dark mages far exceeded Dumbledore's.

So, as far as Dumbledore was concerned, Harry had to kill Voldemort, but he had to die to make Voldemort mortal. It would be impossible even for Dumbledore to find a way around that conundrum, so he had to resign himself to either letting Harry live and thereby indirectly preserving Voldemort's immortality or let Harry die and make Voldemort mortal so that he could be killed. It doesn't take a genius to figure out which option Dumbledore would choose.

Voldemort was the greatest threat to Dumbledore's ideology, the life of one boy was worth nothing when compared to that, especially after all the other lives that had been sacrificed. It would never occur to someone like Dumbledore that it was not his right to sacrifice all those lives. Dumbledore was even more of a monster than Voldemort. His dedication to his ideology made him so much more dangerous to Harry than Voldemort. Despite all his power Voldemort was fairly predictable. Every move he made would look to either increase his power or reduce his vulnerability to death. Harry could work with that.

Dumbledore on the other hand was more of an unknown. Harry did not know where the old man's limits and vulnerabilities lie. It was obvious to Harry that Dumbledore was grooming him to be a martyr. Someone to be kept alive until all the other horcruxes are destroyed. And then Harry would probably have a final meet and greet with Voldemort before he would shuffle off the mortal coil, after which Dumbledore or one of his lackeys would help Voldemort kick the bucket too. And his death like that of the many witches and wizards before him would serve to increase Dumbledore's power.

Harry's lack of any real training in defensive and offensive magics was proof enough of his theory. Forget extra training, even Harry's normal Hogwarts education was substandard when compared with Voldemort's own experiences. Shitty defense teachers and a potions teacher who hated students had meant that the average Hogwarts graduate of the present was a lot less skilled when compared to the ones during Voldemort's time at Hogwarts.

So Harry now had two ridiculously powerful wizards along with their legions of followers after him. One who wanted Harry dead as soon as possible and the other who wanted Harry to die exactly at a time of his choosing. Harry had to resist the powerful urge to curl up into a ball and cry piteously. He consoled himself that despite everything, for the first time in life Harry had a clear idea of his position in the war. And that the knowledge of magic and other information he had gleaned from Voldemort's memories did give him enough of an advantage to start making a few moves of his own, especially since neither Dumbledore nor Voldemort knew of it.

That was his greatest advantage. He could not afford to give either of his enemies even the slightest clue as to the change he had undergone until it was too late for either of them. Voldemort and his allies had always been his enemies, and that wouldn't change anytime soon.

Harry himself needed allies if he were to have any hope of surviving. But the only ones he had were his small group of barely trained friends. He was only a 16 year old student, and so could not exactly go around trying to recruit any worthwhile allies by himself. If he claimed to be trying to open a third front in the war, he would only be laughed at and also tip off Dumbledore that something had changed.

But, luckily for him, he had a potential pool of allies in Dumbledore's Order of the Phoenix. Dumbledore's love for control and secrecy meant that none of his subordinates would be told of Harry's intended fate. That gave Harry an advantage. As far as the rest of the Order of the phoenix is concerned, Harry was an important ally, to be protected until he grew enough in skill to protect himself. They would rally around him to oppose Voldemort and his Death eaters. Harry's only obstacle for creating this situation was Dumbledore.

As long as Dumbledore remained alive, Harry couldn't count the Order of the Phoenix as his allies. So Harry had to eliminate Dumbledore from the equation and use his death to increase his power just as Dumbledore had done several times before. All he had to do was arrange the death of one of the most powerful sorcerers in the world while making sure that he wasn't suspected while preferably implicating or at least pointing the suspicion at Voldemort. Easier said than done, Harry thought sardonically. Even the slightest of suspicions, if cast on him, could alienate him from allies he desperately needed. And he had to succeed in his first attempt as even a single failure would tip off Dumbledore and make things infinitely more difficult for Harry.

But to achieve all that Harry had to slip off the chains that bound him and kept his enemies appraised of his movements. As an underage wizard Harry still had the trace on him. The trace served as a sensor to detect any magic performed around Harry and inform the ministry and also as a tracker to pinpoint Harry's location whenever they wanted to. Harry had after a mastering a complex charm that could detect any spells cast on a person, cast it on himself. And as he had suspected, he had found another trace on him in addition to the normal ministry trace. He suspected this was Dumbledore's way of keeping track of him. Both the spells had similar function, though with subtle differences. The ministry trace would automatically break when he turned seventeen. Dumbledore's wouldn't.

Harry could break both the spells himself, but that would alert both Dumbledore and any interested parties at the ministry, which was a big drawback for Harry. So he had to find a way to fool both the spells rather than break them. The process for doing that was quite simple and Voldemort had done something similar during his fifth year. Harry had to create an artifice which when worn could independently block both the tracking and sensor functions of the trace.

Harry needed an ornament, preferably made of metal, to hold the enchantment. And he found a bronze bracelet that would suit his needs in the room of hidden things, when he went to check on Ravenclaw's diadem. Harry left the horcrux in its place for now. There was no use in moving it until he had a way to destroy it. It would only alert Voldemort if he decided to check up on it. Harry had lost his parseltongue abilities when he expelled the horcrux from his body. He had checked the previous day. It maddened Harry that he had basilisk venom available at such a close distance and he couldn't access it. So Harry had to wait until he could master fiendfyre to destroy it.

The bracelet was old and slightly worn and already had some charms on it, though they had greatly deteriorated with age. Harry had already stripped the bracelet of the remnants of the old charms. All that was left was to add his own enchantments.

Ignoring his friends' half hearted attempts to draw him into their conversation, Harry had turned his thoughts to the seventh occupant of the hospital wing. Dolores Umbridge had been rescued from the forbidden forest by Dumbledore. Harry could almost picture it, Dumbledore striding imperiously into the middle of the centaur settlement and using a combination of subtle threats and promises to convince the centaurs to return her. Harry doubted that the centaurs, despite all their hostility towards humans would dare oppose Dumbledore to his face.

Umbridge herself seemed physically fine, which, Harry thought, was a pity. But according to Madame Pomfrey, she was in shock. The only time she showed any response to outside stimulus was when Ron mimicked the sound of a centaur's hooves. And that sound terrified her. But Harry was not satisfied with that alone. Whatever the centaurs had done would soon be forgotten and she would return to her old nasty self.

Harry doubted that Umbridge would suffer any consequences for actions at Hogwarts. The most she would get was a transfer to a less glamorous position. While Harry would love to kill her, he couldn't, as such an action would draw unnecessary attention to him. Voldemort and his ilk had no need to kill her. Her views on pureblood supremacy had matched theirs and she would make a useful ally for them. And any other political rivals she might have would have no reason to kill her now, as Fudge, who was her greatest supporter, was not going to be in power for long and without him her influence would greatly diminish. So someone like Dumbledore would easily deduce that her killer had a personal vendetta.

Harry's name would be at the top of the list of people who had a personal vendetta on her. But, Harry may have a use for her yet. Umbridge was a bigot whose views were in line with Voldemort's camp. So she was a potential and even likely recruit to the death eaters. Her job at the ministry would therefore bring her into direct contact with most of Voldemort's followers at the ministry. And when the time was right Harry could use her to eliminate most, if not all, of Voldemort's supporters at the ministry. All it would take was an imperius and a carefully planned trap.

Harry's mind was a whirlwind of thoughts as he made and discarded plans at a frantic pace. But for any of his plans to succeed, he needed the ability to do magic without anyone being the wiser. So Harry had, with a firm initial plan in mind, bid adieu to his friends, giving them the excuse of being tired, and returned to his dormitory. He climbed onto his bed and pulled the curtains closed. He pulled out the bracelet from his pocket and placed on a book. He drew his wand and closed his eyes for a moment to gather his magic.

Pointing his wand at the bracelet he cast a charm that was originally designed to block communication between detection wards and their controllers. But as he cast the charm, he concentrated on the flow of magic and he twisted it slightly to suit his particular need, to break communication link between the sensor and its monitor at the ministry and transforming it from a short term use charm into an enchantment with a much longer intended working time. He then carefully recast the charm a few times give the enchantment enough juice and to let the magic settle well in the bracelet. This ability to manipulate general purpose spells to suit more specialized needs was something most well learned wizards possessed. It was time consuming and redundant to create a specific spell for every individual need after all. Voldemort himself had such an instinctive connection to magic that he could even twist his raw magic do his bidding without any proper spell, to achieve effects that no formal spell could achieve.

After he was satisfied with the strength and quality of the enchantment, he carved a tiny anchoring rune on the surface of the bracelet. He then sent tendrils of his magic to seize control of the enchantment and molded an activating trigger and tied it to the rune. Now he could activate and deactivate the blocking enchantment by simply tapping the rune with his wand.

Now he had to layer a second enchantment, this time to block the tracking function of both the traces. The process was similar to the previous enchantment. But it required more finesse to avoid breaking or mutating the previous enchantment. An hour later, a visibly tired but happy Harry sat back and observed his creation. He had to make the enchantments unusually strong to adequately block both the traces. Especially Dumbledore's, since it was much stronger than the ministry trace.

Harry still had a few days before he had to go back to the Dursleys. He wanted to use this time to practice a few powerful spells which cannot be practiced at Privet Drive even with his bracelet because of their flashiness and capacity for destruction.

The next morning, after a lengthy breakfast, Harry set off to meet Hagrid who had returned to Hogwarts. The visit was more to keep up appearances that any real desire to see Hagrid. Harry was walking alone at a leisurely pace as he slipped out of the castle and walked across the grounds. He had just crossed the courtyard and headed down the slope towards Hagrid's hut when whispers pricked at his senses. Harry's instincts screamed at him as he recognized the whispers as incantations. He immediately dived down to the ground and fell into a roll as he felt rather than saw spells fly above him. He completed his roll and came back up in a crouch his wand already in his hand and faced his assailants. There were three of them.

He pointed his wand at the one in the middle and bellowed _"ductile illisus"_

A pulsing yellow ball of magic streaked from his wand tip struck his target with unnerving accuracy. The powerful bludgeoning spell launched his target back ten feet and he collapsed on the ground moaning in agony.

His other opponents seemed to be shocked at his quick retaliation and were too slow to react. Harry, who had by then identified his attackers as Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle relaxed slightly but did not pause or hesitate. He pointed his wand at Crabbe and calmly spoke _"stupefy"._

A red jet of light erupted from his wand and struck Crabbe who was by then waving his wand, perhaps to block his spell, and collapsed where he stood.

Malfoy had by then gathered himself enough to launch a pale pink jet spell which Harry having recognized it as a hex which made painful sores erupt all over the body, deflected with a sneer of contempt.

And the Harry aimed his wand at Malfoy who to his credit was already casting another spell and coldly intoned _"Fulguris"_

Lightning erupted out of his wand tip and struck Malfoy before he could complete his spell. He collapsed on to the ground with a strangled yell and lay there twitching as arcs lightning arced over his body.

"_Stupefy" _Harry stunned Goyle who was crawling towards his wand while still moaning in pain.

Once he saw that all three of them were down and out, he walked towards Crabbe, who was the least damaged.

"_Ennervate"_ the reviving spell shook Crabbe awake and before he shake of his disorientation Harry hit him with a _'petrificus totalus'._

Harryy crouched down near Crabbe's head and peered into his eyes. Tendrils of magic slipped into crabbe's mind as Harry employed his newly gained skills at legilimency. It took only a few moments to gather the information he wanted and Harry withdrew his presence from his classmate's mind and stunned him once more.

Harry stood up as he pondered the information he gleaned from Crabbe's mind. It seemed that all three of the buffoons were angry at their father's incarceration and decided to get revenge on Harry. Unfortunately for them Harry had only been barely visible to the general populace of Hogwarts in the last few days. But a third year slytherin had overheard Harry telling Neville about his plans to visit Hagrid and informed Malfoy, which then led to their pathetic attempt at an ambush.

Even if he did not have the memories of a powerful dark lord, the ambush would have failed. Harry was physically much faster than any of the three and had excellent instincts. He had a lot of experience dodging more dangerous spells cast by adult wizards.

But Harry was furious at their stupidity. It took all of his self control to not resort to the more harmful spells that he knew. Even the bludgeoning hex and the lightning spell could be fatal if he had put in more power and Harry did not need the complications that accidentally killing a student on top everything else he had to deal with.

With that thought in mind Harry cast a few diagnostic charms at Malfoy and Goyle to check the extent of their injuries. Malfoy was unconscious and had electric burns all over his body, painful but not really dangerous. Goyle had four broken ribs. Thankfully they didn't pierce any internal organs.

Harry the checked his surroundings to see if there any students out, but did not find any. It would be prudent to inform a teacher of the fight and get his side of the story out to preempt Snape from making any stink. It seemed that visiting Hagrid needed to be postponed

"Accio" Harry summoned all three of their wands and pocketed them before heading towards castle. He didn't want to see Dumbledore, so he would report to McGonagall who had returned from St. Mungo's just yesterday. They were the only ones with a higher authority than Snape in the castle. It took him ten minutes to reach McGonagall's office. He knocked on the door and waited.

"Enter" a strong voice answered.

He pushed open the door and went in. His first thought was that McGonagall looked as strict as ever. She seemed to have recovered well enough from her injury.

"Good Morning Professor." Harry said.

"A very good morning to you too Mr. Potter" She replied with a smile before continuing.

"What can I do for you?"

"I am here to report an unsanctioned duel Professor" he replied in sincerest voice he could muster.

Her smile changed to a wary look and she motioned with her hand and said

"Please continue"

And so Harry did. He explained the sequence of events thoroughly mentioning everything except his use of legilimency and placed the confiscated wands on her desk. By the end of his story McGonagall sported a severe frown on her face.

"And where are Messrs Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle now?" she asked.

"I left them on the grounds professor." Harry answered without the slightest bit of regret.

McGonagall's frown deepened as she got up from behind the desk and headed towards the fireplace.

"You did not think it prudent that three of your classmates receive immediate medical attention for what sounds like serious injuries? Especially since it was you who injured them in the first place" she reproached him with disapproval evident in her voice.

"With all due respect professor" Harry started in an angry voice as he watched he light the fireplace and throw in a handful of flue powder.

"They waited until I was alone ambushed me from behind. The only reason I am standing here now was because I am managed to turn the tables on them. If they had succeeded in cursing me, I have no doubt at all that I would be in a much worse position than lying unconscious on the grounds." He finished.

"That may be true Mr. Potter. But you are not them and I expect more from my gryffindors." she reproached. Though this time, there was less heat in her voice. And without waiting for a reply she stuck her head in the now green fire while calling out loud

"Severus Snape's office"

Harry heard her explain the situation to Snape as he formulated a reply to her question.

She finished her conversation and drew her head out of the fire.

"I informed Professor Snape of the incident, and as we speak, he is on his way to transport Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle to the hospital wing" she informed Harry. Harry noted the lack of prefixes before the names. McGonagall only eliminated prefixes before students' names when she was really angry at them.

Harry thought now was a good time to appear apologetic, to get on her good side before Snape arrived to make a stink.

"I am sorry professor." he stated mustering as much sincerity as he could.

"I should have brought them to the hospital wing myself" he continued, sounding regretful.

"But at the time… I was angry at them….. When they tried to curse me from behind… I reacted instinctively… and had I used more dangerous spells or had the spells I used struck at different places…. they could have died… the bludgeoning spell I used on Goyle struck him in the chest and probably broke a few ribs… but had I mistakenly aimed a little higher, I could have broken his neck" Harry said, his voice full of fake regret.

"I was very angry…both at them and myself. I checked them over with a diagnostic spell I knew and upon confirming that they were not seriously injured, I left them there as a lesson. I wanted them to suffer for their stupidity so that they would not try something like this again" Harry continued.

"And though it may sound silly now….. At the time I thought they might be acting on orders from death eaters…. All of their fathers are death eaters whom I had fought before,…Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle never made it any secret that they shared their ideology…All they would have to do was stun me and carry me to the edge of the school wards to hand me over to someone else…They knew that with Professor Dumbledore back at Hogwarts, I would let my guard down" Harry said weaving a tale which, while fanciful, had enough elements of reality to make even McGonagall take him seriously. Indeed looking at McGonagall's pale face she seemed to be seriously considering that possibility, And with that thought Harry went in for the kill.

"Or maybe it was not so silly….Voldemort had done some pretty unconventional things before…he had the fake moody enter me into the tri wizard tournament and we did not suspect him until the end because we never expected that the notoriously paranoid Mad-eye Moody could be so easily captured and replaced… and by the same token he could use sympathetic students to do his bidding at the school because no one would expect him to use students" Harry expounded to a McGonagall who was, by now, nodding her head thoughtfully.

"Even if that was not the case it this incident, He might use both marked and unmarked students in the future. Sirius once told me that his brother Regulus was marked in the summer before his final year at school" Harry finished. Sirius didn't really tell him about Regulus joining up before his final year. The only thing Sirius told Harry about Regulus was the he joined the death eaters and was killed by them when he tried to back out. The bit about Regulus joining before his final year, Harry got from Voldemort. But since Sirius was dead nobody could question him about it.

"You may be right Mr. Potter" started McGonagall,

"I will take your worries to the Headmaster. It would be imprudent not to take your warnings seriously. Especially after all the times I ignored your warnings and you were proven right in the end." She continued.

"As for your duel, I can see that you conducted yourself as well as can be expected of someone of your age and taking into account your recent experiences, I will let you go without any punishment…As for Messrs Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle, you can rest assured they will receive appropriate punishment for their actions" She finished ending what was probably the lengthiest conversation he ever had with her.

"Thank you Professor" Harry said as he exited the office.

Harry walked briskly for a few dozen paces and ducked into an empty classroom and cast a disillusionment charm on himself before exiting the classroom. Harry didn't want to face Snape who would no doubt be spitting fire by now, especially if he learned that Harry had gotten away with cursing his students without even a slap on the wrist. Harry noted with satisfaction that the quality of the charm had improved slightly since his first attempt. It was a good enough substitute to his invisibility cloak to all but the most observant people.

Harry was not afraid to face Snape. But he was not confident in his ability to reign in his hatred if the spy started needling him. Especially since Harry now knew exactly who informed Voldemort of the prophecy's existence. Harry also had a vivid memory of Snape begging Voldemort to spare Harry's mother before he attacked the Potters.

Harry had no clue as to why Snape was so desperate to save his mother. The only interaction he had seen involving both of them was the memory in Snape's pensieve and neither of them appeared friendly with each other. Voldemort himself didn't care for Snape's reasons. But he did value Snape enough to at least make a token effort to spare his mother when he asked her to step aside. Snape's relation to his mother was a mystery he had every intention of solving after he had achieved some more important objectives.

With that thought in mind, Harry headed toward the room of requirement. He walked to and fro thrice, imagining the room he wanted while still hidden under the disillusionment charm. A door appeared on the blank stretch of wall and Harry opened the door and entered the room.

The room in its current iteration was a large square chamber with an obsidian floor and smooth rock walls. There was a large table at the farthest wall beside which there was a large bronze cauldron. Harry made his way over to the cauldron carefully walking at the edges of the room. The cauldron was full of a pale blue potion which Harry brewed the previous night.

As soon as Harry decided to use ritual magic to help increase his skill he had come to the room of rituals as he had taken to calling it. The first ritual Harry wanted to do was one which would help him eliminate most common wand movements and thereby make spell casting easier and faster. The ritual used for this purpose was remarkably flexible. It had been first designed several centuries ago. Before even Hogwarts had been found and had since then been heavily refined.

The ritual had a basic template into which the runic diagrams comprising of the individual wand movements could be added or removed depending on user's needs. At its simplest the ritual needed the runic diagrams for at least three wand movements to be included so when performed successfully, the user would gain an intimate knowledge of the patterns in which magic is molded as if he had repeatedly used spells comprising the three wand movements dozens of times. Using the ritual a few times would allow the user to eliminate those particular wand movements in any spell that they are a part of and perform the magic molding through just mental focus.

A more ambitious wizard or witch could include more wand motions in the ritual in multiples of three. So the ritual could include three, six, nine or even more wand motions. The more wand motions that are included, the larger and more complex the ritual circle would get and the longer the ritual would take to complete.

Generally users wouldn't try any more than nine wand motions in a single sitting as the more complex a ritual circle becomes the greater chance for errors. Voldemort who was supremely confident in his own abilities did all thirty commonly used wand movements in a single ritual. Though he cheated by using the very same room Harry was using now. If the sentinel was the greatest bit of magic Harry had ever seen, the room of requirement was every bit it's equal. It's sheer complexity boggled the mind. The room created any room required of its user with its magic. That it could conjure a room stable enough to conduct complex ritual magic was an amazing achievement. Ritual magic was highly volatile. Even a beginner knew not to involve foreign magic in a ritual. Conjured objects in particular are absolutely forbidden from any rituals. But the room of rituals was so stable that it might as well be a real room.

Harry who had very little time to master a lot of complex magic had decided to go even further than Voldemort. In addition to the thirty common wand movements, Harry had added nine more exotic wand motions used in some powerful Dark spells taking the total to thirty nine wand motions in a single ritual. The runic diagrams for the nine extra wand motions were created by Voldemort long after he left Hogwarts. Harry had taken advantage of that knowledge and included them in the ritual.

Ritual circles can be drawn using a variety of material, on whose properties the power and success of the ritual depends. Harry decided to use blood, his blood to be precise. The room had as per his desires provided the ritual circle as interconnected grooves carved in the obsidian stone floor in the center of the room. All Harry had to do to complete the circle was pour his blood into the grooves. But unfortunately for Harry, the circle was so large that Harry couldn't provide enough blood to fill all of it in one sitting and still hope to live. So he had to carefully draw and store enough blood every day and use some heavy blood replenishment potions to recharge himself.

Harry had employed Dobby's help to purchase the necessary ingredients and had him sworn to secrecy. After which he carefully brewed the complex potion. Harry made a careful incision over the radial artery and carefully withdrew enough blood to fill an unbreakable glass beaker which was also purchased by dobby. He then healed the wound and lay back exhausted. After a few minutes of rest, he scooped up a goblet full of blood replenishing potion and gulped it down. The potion alone was not enough though. He had to eat a lot of food for the potion to achieve maximum efficiency. With that thought in mind Harry sealed the beaker that contained his blood and cast a special preservative charm on it before heading to the kitchens for a post breakfast pre lunch meal.

The next few days passed by in a rush. Harry had used every free moment he had away from his friends by practicing his magic and preparing for the ritual. Going to and from the room several times a day without being spotted by the portraits, ghosts and a vengeful Snape was a chore. It meant Harry had to make an extensive use of the invisibility cloak or the disillusionment charm.

Yet, these visits only served to bolster Harry's confidence. He mastered new spells much faster than even he expected. But all good things come to an end and Harry's relative freedom had been diminished by the release of his friends from the hospital wing.

It was the night before his last at Hogwarts this year. They would all be heading back on the Hogwarts express on the morning of the day after tomorrow. Harry had snuck out after everyone had fallen asleep and went to the room of rituals. All the preparations for the ritual were complete. He had collected enough blood and had checked and rechecked every inch of the ritual circle. He had taken a lengthy nap in the afternoon to be well rested and refreshed for what was going to be a lengthy ritual.

He carefully poured his blood into the ritual circle and checked to make sure that it flowed to all the nooks and crannies. The smooth obsidian helped with the flow. Harry then stripped off his clothes until he was stark naked except for his wand and a ritual knife and levitated himself to the large blank circle in the middle of the larger ritual circle. The middle of the ritual circle had three smaller circles one which was completely isolated from the rest of the ritual circle and two others which were connected to the ritual circle and filled with blood. Harry seated himself, careful not to disturb anything. The isolated circle, called the inert circle was a feature every well designed ritual had. It was situated in front of Harry with the blood filled circles on either side of him. The inert circle as the name suggests was an area with which the magic of the ritual does not interact. It was used to store extraneous objects which needed to be brought into the ritual circle but were not a part of the ritual.

Harry placed his wand in the inert circle and palmed the ritual knife. He carefully made small incisions in the center of both of his palms and then dropped the knife beside his wand inside the inert circle. Harry then carefully positioned his palms above the blood filled circles on either side of him and slowly lowered them until his hands touched the blood in the circles. This ritual circle was finally complete.

Harry closed his eyes while starting a chant to help his concentration as he pulled his magic to his palms which was much tougher without a wand. As soon as the magic reached his hands, the ritual circle lit up marking the beginning of the ritual. The dark red blood started to glow brightly as the circle took control of Harry's magic and guided along the patterns it was designed to do.

As soon as the ritual took control of his magic, Harry slipped into a deep trance. He lost all sense of time as his magic began an elaborated dance. Again and again his magic twisted itself into beautiful patterns as the ritual did its work. When the ritual ended almost seven hours later, when the blood which was the medium for the ritual completely disappeared from the circle, Harry was more mentally and physically exhausted than he had ever been in his life.

The tiny cuts on his palm were as fresh as they had been at the start of the ritual. It took him several tries to heal even those tiny cuts in exhausted state. He slowly dressed himself and slipping on his invisibility cloak while giving himself a pat on the back for thinking of bringing it. Harry didn't think he could cast a disillusionment charm in his current state even if his life depended on it. He slowly made his way to his dorm before his quietly stashed away his invisibility cloak and slipped into his bed.

In what seemed like no time at all, he was being shaken awake by Ron.

"Wake up mate!" shouted Ron as he shook Harry.

Harry slowly sat up on his bed with a groan, feeling only marginally less tired than before.

"Wake up" said Ron again.

"You already missed Breakfast. Its lunch time now" he continued as he stared at Harry in concern.

"Jeez.. what's up with you? You normally don't sleep this late" Ron questioned.

"I slept all afternoon yesterday… So I couldn't sleep all night. I fell asleep only in the morning, just after dawn" Harry answered using his pre prepared excuse.

"I seem to have messed up my sleep cycle." Harry continued while covering up a yawn.

"Good thing you woke up me up now or I would have had trouble sleeping tonight too" said Harry while giving Ron a tired grin as he headed towards the bathroom.

For Harry, the rest of the day passed at a bewilderingly slow pace, especially when compared to his previous days. He refrained from using much magic. The ritual was a complete success. Harry estimated that he would need about eleven more iterations before he would achieve a complete mastery of all the wand movements.

Ron and Hermione chattered on endlessly as he unenthusiastically chipped in to their conversations. After a bland dinner which ended with Dumbledore's year end speech Harry slipped off to bed early.

The next day Harry woke up early and fully refreshed. The train ride passed by in amiable conversation. Malfoy who seemed to have learned something from his last encounter with Harry steered clear of him and soon they were at platform nine and three quarters in King's cross station.

Harry stepped off the Hogwarts express and headed towards the waiting order members while dragging his feather light trunk with one hand.

Author's Note:

**Hello to all the readers**

**I decided to make a few things clear about the direction this fan fiction is going to take or rather isn't going to take.**

**There will be no slash. The site already has too much slash fiction most of which is utter garbage. Mpreg? Seriously?.**

**The premise of this fanfiction, the memory dump is itself a big cliché. So I will try my best to avoid any other clichés.**

**Harry isn't going to inherit a bazillion galleons, exotic weapons, or ridiculously powerful magic books from some fancy ancestors. He will only have what he inherited from his parents and Sirius.**

**He is not going to have any special powers that are rare or unique to him through so bizarre inheritance. Magic itself is a special enough power and with Voldemort's knowledge, Harry will shape up to be a very dangerous wizard.**

**As for Dumbledore, many fics claim that he is a super intelligent manipulator. Yet he becomes a bumbling fool when an angry Harry confronts him in front a few of the order members and spouts bullshit lines which wouldn't convince a toddler of his sincerity.**

**And then there are fics where he steals money from Harry. Dumbledore is a very old and very powerful wizard with a large network of allies. He holds a number of politically powerful offices and is friends with Nicholas flamel whose philosopher's stone could turn any metal into gold. If he needed money to fund a war he had far better avenues than stealing money from a kid.**

**Hell he had the stone with him for a whole year, if not more. He could have transmuted enough gold to buy a country in that time.**

**I don't even want to go near shit like unbreakable marriage contracts and soul bonds. They make me lose interest in what would otherwise be a good fic.**

**My fic would feature a Harry who would try his damndest to hide his changes from his enemies. Not one who would endlessly proclaim how much he changed to anyone who had the misfortune of meeting him.**

**This fic would be a three way chess match between Dumbledore, Voldemort and Harry with enough action mixed in to make things deliciously exciting.**

**Romance is not the main focus of this fic. But there will be enough of that to spice things up a bit. Through the length of this fic, I plan to have Harry go through a few pairings, though never two at the same time and none of them serious enough for him to end up in love or god forbid married in the middle of the fic.**

**I would love any suggestions about spell ideas and new magics which can be introduced. Please PM me with your ideas.**

**Reviews are welcome. Criticism is what drives us to better ourselves. So don't be afraid to hurt any feelings and critique away.**

**Yours Sincerely,**

**Sattilallu**


	3. Chapter 3: First Strike

**Harry Potter: Pursuit of Power**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.**

**Chapter 3: First Strike.**

Harry Potter was currently sprawled on his back on the bed in the smallest bedroom of the Dursley home. He had just returned from school that evening and had been picked up by the Dursleys at King's Cross station. He had made some plans before coming to Privet Drive to deal with the Dursleys. He had a lot of plans for the summer and couldn't be bothered to be saddled with dozens of chores like all his previous holidays. But it hadn't been necessary for him to do anything. A few members of the Order of the Phoenix, Mad-eye Moody and Arthur Weasley in particular, had taken it upon themselves to warn the Dursleys to treat him well.

So far, the threat seemed to have worked. He had been given a slightly larger amount of food than he would normally get at dinner and the Dursleys completely ignored his presence. Uncle Vernon had a minor blow up in the car on their way back from the station. But other than that, the Dursleys had left him alone, which suited his needs just fine.

He had a lot of work to do tomorrow. With his return no longer denied by the ministry, Voldemort would already be making some moves to eliminate his opposition. Harry had some ideas as to who Voldemort would be targeting. So he had move quickly and quietly to pre-empt the dark lord and hopefully gain a few allies in the process. With that thought in mind Harry activated the rune which blocked the sensor portion of his traces, sealed the bedroom door closed with a locking spell and slowly surrendered himself to Morpheus' grasp.

Harry woke up quite early the next morning, almost an hour before the time the Dursleys would wake up. He used this time to freshen up and by the time his Aunt came down to the kitchen, he was gorging down a delicious beef sandwich that he made for himself.

"What are you doing boy?!" Aunt Petunia hissed.

Her face had a pinched expression and Harry knew she was suppressing the urge to smack him with a frying pan or some other utensil, as she had done so many times when he was younger.

Harry took his time to chew and swallow his bite before he answered her.

"I am eating my breakfast," He replied in a condescending tone, giving her his best 'are you stupid?' look.

A small part of him crowed in delight as he watched her face flush at his insinuation towards her level of intelligence. When Harry was much younger, Aunt Petunia had him spend all his free time cooped with her either in the kitchen or in the adjacent dining room. Ostensibly to teach him how to do various chores and to keep an eye on him to make sure he didn't cause any trouble.

Harry, like most other children his age was very inquisitive and as bored as he was, with having to spend so much time under Petunia's oppressive presence, couldn't stop himself from asking questions even if it irritated his aunt. Petunia always snapped back with irritated answers, complaining every time that he was stupid to not know that. For a while Harry really thought that he was stupid. While he had eventually wised up to the fact that he was not any less intelligent that most other children, the continuous berating had done its damage. It made him very reluctant to ask too many questions either in class or in real life situations.

Petunia played a major role in stifling his desire to excel. If not for a collusion of improbable events which gave him Voldemort's memories, Harry would never have realized the potential he had and even if he did realize the extent of his potential, he probably wouldn't have had the desire to achieve it. He knew now that Petunia did that as a petty revenge out of jealousy towards his mother. She took malicious pleasure in telling him he was stupid, knowing full well the effect such behaviour would have on a kid like him.

Mocking her in a manner so similar to her own was petty, but Harry didn't care. It took a remarkable amount of self control to refrain from cursing her. The hatred he felt for her was eclipsed by only by the hatred he felt for the likes of Dumbledore. Even Voldemort and Bellatrix did not evoke such a feeling in him, probably because they had always been his enemies. Petunia on the other hand was his Aunt. She may not love him, but she had a duty to protect him both physically and mentally. She had failed miserably at that, just as Dumbledore predicted she would.

Harry couldn't do magic in front of the Dursleys unless absolutely necessary. He was reasonably sure that members of the Order were keeping an eye on his house and he couldn't afford to tip them off about his ability to do magic without being detected just to get a little revenge. He had bigger things to worry about. So he suppressed the urge to try a few jinxes on his so called family. Stealth and secrecy were his greatest allies now. So the fewer people that knew about his ability to do magic undetected, the better. The Dursleys would probably still be around when he'd won his personal war. He could curse them to his heart's content then.

"I am going to be out all day," Harry told Petunia before she could snap off a nasty response.

"I have some things to take care of, I will be back only in the evening," He continued.

"And who do you think is going to do your chores?" Petunia asked.

Harry stopped eating and stared at her quietly for a long moment, just to make her uncomfortable. He hadn't done much of any chores last summer either. So he knew Petunia was just trying to needle him.

"You seemed to have managed quite well all year," Harry drawled.

"If you cannot do them yourself, get Dudley to help out, He could do with losing some weight…no, make that a lot of weight," he continued, watching with satisfaction as Petunia's face flushed.

His Aunt could never stomach anyone implying that Dudley was anything less than perfect.

"I have done enough unpaid work over the years and I am not going to do any more, If you have a problem with that take it up with Dumbledore," He finished.

Petunia's red face paled quickly at hearing Dumbledore's name. It seemed to have reminded her of the order's warning. She sniffed and turned away from him.

"Finish up quickly and get out of the house," she said finishing the conversation, unable to resist the urge to have the last word. It was because she was turned away from him that she missed seeing his hand twitch perceptibly as he suppressed the urge to draw his wand. That reflex was another thing he inherited from Voldemort. It seems muscle memory; despite its name is a purely mental process. The only thing preventing his reflexes from being as fast as Voldemort's is physical conditioning.

Harry finished his rather large sandwich and trudged up the stairs to his bedroom, pondering his aunt. Harry found several curious peculiarities about her. From Dumbledore's howler last summer, Harry knew Petunia had prior correspondence with the old headmaster. Probably long before his Hogwarts letters had come. Petunia obviously knew that Hogwarts would come calling near his eleventh birthday, just as she knew a lot of other things about the magical world. Yet she never failed to act surprised when something magical happened.

Harry knew now that it was just pretension, probably for Vernon's sake. He wondered how messed up she had to be to pretend so much. Neither Vernon nor Petunia could stomach the existence of magic, Vernon out of bigotry and Petunia out of jealousy. So they ignored it and pretended it didn't exist. But reality smacked them in the face with his arrival at their doorstep. His very presence reminded them of something they would never understand or have. So they hated him and did their best to make him as miserable as possible.

The Dursleys' behavior was in many ways similar to the manner in which Fudge and the rest of the Wizarding world behaved all throughout last year. Ignoring things they do not like or understand was a common failure of most humans, wizard and muggle alike. Harry himself was guilty of this failing.

He was afflicted with a pathological need to be accepted. So, no matter how many times people turned against him, he always ignored it or considered it a temporary problem. But his experiences last year told him a different story. Just because he was nice or right didn't mean people would like him. He would always be judged based on the perceptions and desires of the general public. When they see something they did not like or hear something they did not want to hear, they would turn on him.

Voldemort had used Fudge's paranoia and lust for power to mask his return and harass Harry all year. It was only fluke that Fudge had seen Voldemort in the atrium of the ministry. If Voldemort had left a little early or if Fudge had arrived a little late, Harry would have been in Azkaban by now.

But Harry was wiser now. He had lost the need to live up to other people's expectations. He would fight only for himself now. He would help only those who would be useful to him. The rest of the world could go to hell for all he cared.

Once in his room, Harry dressed himself in a set of plain black robes that he purchased for casual use in the magical world as he readied himself for today's excursion. He palmed his wand and waved it in an intricate twirl.

"_Homenum Revelio"_ he muttered.

A wave of magic that was visible only to his eyes erupted in all directions from the tip of his and barely a moment later an image of all the humans within twenty meters of his position appeared in his mind's eye.

Just as he suspected, there was someone lying down right in the middle of the Dursleys' lawn. Harry couldn't see anyone in the place where his charm had indicated the presence of a person. So Harry supposed they were under an invisibility cloak.

Harry had to sneak out, complete his work and sneak back in without alerting his minder. Sneaking out and getting back in would not be much of a problem unless his guard was Alastor Moody. But Harry knew that Moody or one of the other aurors were too valuable to waste on guard duty, especially now that things are heating up. Harry hoped that his present minder, whoever he or she was, wouldn't become suspicious if Harry wasn't seen outside for the whole day. It was not out of character for Harry to spend the whole day in his room when he was brooding. He had done it plenty of times last summer. So unless his minder was someone new they wouldn't be suspicious about not seeing him out the whole day.

Harry carefully applied a glamour charm to mask his features. Glamour charms are simple illusions, easy to cast and easier to dispel. Hence they cannot be used as long term disguises. Since they are simple illusions they cannot be used to mimic other people's physical appearance adequately. But they suited Harry's purpose well enough. He now looked like plain, forgettable brown haired wizard in his twenties who happened to have a similar build to Harry Potter.

Harry activated the second rune on his bracelet to mask his location to both Dumbledore and the ministry and walked out of the back door of the Dursley residence under his invisibility cloak. He walked for a few blocks until he reached an empty plot with a tight grove of trees. He walked to the centre of the grove and cast a powerful sound isolation ward and a notice me not charm to keep away any interested muggles. There was just enough space in between the trees to fit four people while standing. It would serve as a perfect apparition point.

After making sure the charms were properly cast, Harry stuffed the invisibility cloak in his pocket and disapparated with an audible pop. He reappeared at the designated apparition point in an alley which was a minute's walk from the public entrance to the ministry of magic.

He was the only one present in the alley. Harry quickly moved a few feet away and covered himself in his invisibility cloak.

Only employees were normally allowed to apparate directly into the ministry building and Harry hated and distrusted floo travel. So the visitor's entrance was the only other way into the ministry.

It had been a fortnight since Voldemort's resurrection had been publicly acknowledged by Fudge and Harry didn't know what additional protections had been put in place to prevent people from infiltrating the centre of Britain's magical government. The ministry of magic was notorious for its inefficiency. Very few people in the hierarchy had the will to take initiative. That was what allowed Voldemort to come so close to winning the last time. Between Dumbledore and Voldemort, they had managed to neutralize most of the truly strong witches or wizards in the ministry hierarchy. Taking these factors into consideration; it was very unlikely that the ministry would drastically increase its security, at least until Fudge was kicked out of office.

But Harry felt it was better to be safe than sorry. So there he was standing in wait under a glamour and an invisibility cloak. The glamour provided an extra layer of security if he was detected even with his invisibility cloak on. As unlikely as that was, it would give him the option of escaping without revealing his identity.

"_Salata Olemus"_ Harry muttered, while tapping his wand on his heart.

Hidden from view by his invisibility cloak, his skin was covered in a pearly white luminescence for a moment, confirming the successful casting of a presence concealing spell. It was an obscure little spell that hid a person's presence from most detection enchantments. It can even conceal his presence from spells like the 'Homenum Revelio'.

Now all he had to do was wait. The Visitors' entrance required a declaration of name and intent to enter the ministry and there is a good chance that security wizards would be standing guard at the bottom of lift to check for harmful substances or disguises. So he had to piggyback a ride with some other witch or wizard.

Twenty minutes later, a tiny witch appeared with the deafening crack of a poorly controlled apparition. Harry rolled his eyes as he observed the older woman check herself to see if she had all her limbs intact. The witch looked to be of a similar age as Molly Weasley, which meant that she had to be using apparition for around thirty years. So it was very pathetic that she would still be so clumsy at the skill. But her apparent lack of skill would make things simpler for him.

Harry waited until the woman passed by his position before he pointed his wand at her back.

"_Imperio"_ he coldly intoned.

There was a slight distortion of air as his nearly invisible spell struck the witch. Despite its reputation, the imperius was a relatively simple spell. It did not need extravagant wand movements or an extensive study of the dark arts. What it did require was a strong will and a desire to dominate, both of which Harry had in spades.

The woman paused for a second as her mind stuttered at the unexpected violation before she continued down the alley, this time acting according to Harry's will. Harry's skill in legilimency meant that unlike a regular user of the curse, he could fluidly control his victim by implanting commands directly into her mind instead of having to verbalize them.

Harry walked a few feet behind his thrall making only the barest of noises. His shoes were charmed to muffle his footsteps, reducing the chance of someone detecting him by the sound of his footsteps. This gave him the freedom to move at a fast pace without spooking any bystanders.

The telephone booth that served as an entrance to the ministry looked exactly as it had the year before. There was no increase or decrease in the amount of damage it had. It was probably enchanted to remain in that exact state as long as it was used by the ministry.

Harry entered the booth behind the witch and closed the door. The inside was not too cramped as the both Harry and the woman had small builds. The witch dialled the number which served as the code to intimate the hidden mechanism behind the lift that the current inhabitant of the box was aware of the magical world and needed to gain entrance to the ministry of magic. Harry watched quietly as the woman gave her name as Judith White and mentioned the purpose of her visit while making no mention of his presence.

Harry waited, tense with anticipation, as the lift descended below the street level. Almost a minute later the telephone booth jangled to a halt in the atrium. The door opened and just before Judith exited, he lifted the imperius curse and hit her with a nonverbal memory modification charm, using the remnants of his presence in her mind to twist her memories. She would believe that she had entered the ministry on her own will just as she originally intended, forgetting her experience under the imperius curse and his presence beside her in the booth.

The imperius curse had been necessary as the person he chose to piggyback with would sense his presence when there were only a few centimetres separating the both of them even if he was hidden under the invisibility cloak. In the current political climate, an invisible presence near the ministry entrance could trigger a panic and lead to his detection.

He exited the lift a few seconds after Judith whose mind was slightly hazy after being subjected to two heavy duty mind altering charms in quick succession.

As he had predicted there was a new security station only a few meters away from the lift where two security wizards sat, ready to poke any visitors with a few strange looking instruments that were supposed to detect anything or anyone harmful.

The atrium was just as full of wizards and witches as it had been the last time he had been here, but the crowds were much quieter and the few people who were conversing with their neighbours were doing so in hushed whispers. There was a grim atmosphere as serious looking wizards inspected everyone entering the ministry, employee or visitor. Unlike last year when there had been only one shabbily dressed security wizard slouching at his table on the far end of the Hall, there were eight wizards whom he recognized as members of the magical law enforcement squad manning the four security desks and four others who were patrolling the large hall.

The presence of a dozen law enforcement officials had a rather noticeable effect on the other witches and wizards. They stood in orderly queues to submit to inspection without any complaints.

To the unenlightened observer, beefing up security at the heart of the government by using trained wizards might seem like a wise move. But to Harry who could come up with a dozen far more efficient ways to secure the ministry while tying up far fewer wizards with useless guard duty, it seemed like a patently stupid move. It was so stupid in fact that it had Fudge's signature all over it.

There were quite a few enchantments which could be used to perform all if more than the functions the MLE officers were currently fulfilling. Harry knew that the ministry had enough skilled magicians in its ranks to cast such enchantments and even if it didn't, the ministry had enough money in its coffers to hire wizards who could. Such enchantments would provide much better protection than having MLE officers molest people with their dubious dark magic detectors. They would also free up the MLE squad to flexibly respond to any emergencies as and when they occur.

But Fudge, who had always been obsessed with 'being seen' doing something than actually doing something, resorted to the stupidest of all possible methods to increase security. He wilfully tied up trained wizards in guard duty when they could be out hunting death eaters and sacrificed expediency and efficiency for an appearance of strength and decisiveness.

While aurors were the ones primarily tasked to hunt down dark wizards, the magical law enforcement squad could provide valuable back up when necessary as they had much larger numbers.

Even doing nothing would have been a better alternative. Harry doubted that the dozen wizards guarding the atrium were the only ones saddled with such duty. He would not be surprised if Fudge had sent all the other members of the MLE squad to guard all the other public places in a similar fashion.

The guards may not be of much use against Voldemort, but they did a damn good job of blocking the atrium with wizards and witches waiting to submit to inspection. It took Harry nearly twenty minutes to walk to the other end of the atrium and through the golden gates to the room which had all the lifts. He had to move slowly and carefully to avoid running into anyone. Once there, he moved away from the lifts and walked to the far end of the room where a tiny opening led to a spiral staircase that led both up and down. It would be remarkably stupid of him to use a lift when he was aiming to be stealthy.

Even wizards were not crazy enough to construct a building deep underground and use lifts as the only means to travel between the floors. But the staircase left a lot to be desired. It was narrow, cramped and its entrance was tucked away in an unnoticed corner as if having a staircase was something to be ashamed of.

As if that was not enough, it was a spiral staircase and Harry hated spiral staircases, especially narrow ones like the one in front of him. They made him feel like even the slightest misstep would send him tumbling down to the bottom. Even the moving stairs at Hogwarts didn't evoke such a feeling in him.

Harry sighed and began what was going to be a long climb. The ministry of magic had not always been where it was now. The predecessor to the current building existed in the exact same spot but above the ground. Voldemort had briefly entertained the thought of joining the ministry during his first few years in Hogwarts before he went on to become a dark lord. He had researched the ministry very thoroughly using all the resources the Hogwarts library could provide him. Decades later when he made his bid for power he learnt even more about its secrets and its history.

For most of the last few centuries, Muggle Britain had always been on the brink of war if not actually at war. These wars for the most part had no direct effect on the magical world until one day, at the tail end of the nineteenth century, when a barrage of artillery fire landed on the house of an old and large pureblood clan called the Aylwins and brought it crumbling down, killing everyone in it.

While this would not be the first or the last time wizards and witches were killed by muggles, it was the first time since the implementation of the statute of secrecy that such a large number of people were killed at the same time and that too unintentionally. The tragedy was compounded by the fact that the family was killed not as collateral damage in a war but when the muggle military was practicing accurate artillery fire techniques in what they thought was a deserted area.

The death of an old and well known pureblood line ignited a furious debate in the magical world and when it was learnt that it was nothing more than an unfortunate accident, many accomplished witches and wizards poured their efforts into creating enchantments that could withstand such weapons. But a few muggleborn witches and wizards of the time observed that muggle weapons evolved much faster and if a genuine full scale war ever broke out and if any unfortunate wizard dwelling were to come under direct and sustained fire, then even the newly designed enchantments would eventually fail.

The ministry of magic of the time was a large building in the middle of muggle London and hence would be one of the buildings under the most danger if such a scenario were to play out. The development of flight by muggles followed by the extensive use of Airplanes during the First World War and the debate among the muggle militaries about the development of bombers and chemical weapons triggered another panic in the magical world. Wizards with little to no understanding of the weapons the muggles were developing only understood that the muggles were developing weapons that would rain fire or poison on cities from the skies and deduced that going very deep underground was the only way to truly secure the ministry. So after much debate, a decision was made to build a large structure deep underground instead of working together in large numbers to layer tougher enchantments or even moving the ministry to a less important location. To the wizards of that day, moving the ministry to another location, while sensible, easier and cheaper, seemed tantamount to admitting that they were afraid of muggles and hence not an acceptable alternative.

Construction of the new ministry started in the middle of the First World War. The new building was envisioned not just as an administrative centre but also as a sanctuary to the common magical populace in a similar vein to Hogwarts, should the need ever arise to evacuate their homes. The project was seen as so prestigious and important to the future of magical Britain and Ireland that a large number of wizards from all political factions came together and contributed either gold or magic to its construction. It was the first and only time in recent history that the entire population of the wizarding world was so united.

Clans of Dwarves were hired for their expertise in underground construction. The goblins too were quite good at underground constructions, but they were not trusted enough for such an important project. Dwarves on the other hand were the only magical race with whom wizards got on well enough. Conflicts between wizards and dwarves were few and rare. While they had their own customs and traditions, they were similar enough to wizards that they didn't evoke distrust as the goblins did. It also helped that they didn't try to steal the secrets of wand making like the goblins often did or insisted that any items or structures of their make should be returned to them after the death of the original owner.

Unfortunately there were few if any dwarven clans in the British Isles, so they had to be hired from abroad. It was built almost a mile underground and took thirty years to complete the construction and the subsequent enchantment. To this day it held the record for the deepest continuously inhabited building. The original plan for the building had ten floors, but it had later been expanded to twelve. The telephone box which functioned as a lift started its descent slowly and took about a minute to reach its destination. The minute the box took to descend was spent in complete darkness and that darkness and a few subtle enchantments masked the fact that the lift rapidly accelerates and travels extremely fast for most of its journey. The enchantments on the telephone box were remarkably similar, though of a higher quality, to the ones on the Knight Bus.

The news of the existence and use of atomic bombs had eventually trickled down to the architects of the original proposal. This gave them a reason to pat themselves on the back and rebrand the paranoia that made them dig so deep underground as foresight. Unknown to most of the public, a small taskforce made up of muggleborns and halfbloods with knowledge of the muggle world was formed under the aegis of the Department of Mysteries to keep abreast of the developments of muggle technology and to advise the higher ups in the government on ways to overcome them.

Approximately a thousand wizards and hundreds of dwarves worked for over three decades to build the ministry. Harry remembered that it had taken about five hundred wizards only a few months to build a stadium which seated a hundred thousand people during the quidditch world cup and about a month more to strip it down without leaving a trace. The ministry unlike the stadium was a mile underground in the middle of London and it had to be constructed without completely disrupting the daily running of the ministry so it was much more impressive. It was a testament to the kind of projects the magical world could undertake if a large number of people worked together.

The only other building which was just as impressive was Hogwarts and that was because it was built almost a thousand years ago. The internal dimensions of the ministry were so huge physically that there had been no need to use expansion charms which were commonly prevalent in most magical structures. The outer walls of the structure were several meters thick and built with a special material that was a much stronger dwarven alternative to concrete that they had perfected over the centuries. The walls were then heavily enchanted with strengthening magic by the wizards to make it immune to even earth quakes.

At roughly the same time period as the construction of the new ministry was completed, the Second World War and the Grindelwald war came to an end in continental Europe. The simultaneous wars left the various ministries on the continent in devastation. Taking an example from the British, most of them went on to replace their ministries and other important buildings with more sturdier or remote alternatives. Some emulated Britain and went underground while others chose remote locations like the middle of the desert or high up in the mountains. This strange phenomenon of relocating governments eventually spread to other continents as if there had been an unannounced competition. The majority of the countries cited the spectre of global nuclear warfare as a reason for such displacement. Most wizards may not understand what atomic bombs are, but the relevant authorities in the ministries understood enough to know that being within a few miles of one when it went off was extremely unwise.

Harry had to agree with the likes Voldemort and Grindelwald that wizards were inherently superior to muggles. The magical world may not be politically or socially superior to the more developed muggle societies, but it most definitely had superior capabilities. Harry had no doubt that even today; muggle technology would be unable to build a structure that could match the ministry of magic. Even if they were to achieve such a technical capability in the future, the costs of such an undertaking would be so prohibitively huge that even the richer nations would be hesitant to finance it. The magical world could just do things better and cheaper with far less resources and a much lesser understanding of the principles that govern the world. The funny thing was that this inherent superiority had nothing to do with any effort on the part of the magical population. It was merely a fluke of evolution.

The ministry had twelve levels in total and strangely the atrium which served as an entrance to the ministry was on the eighth level. Harry had to admit that it made a bizarre sort of sense that the entrance hall be in the middle of the structure. That way, people who need go up or down wouldn't have to traverse too many floors. The first seven levels housed the various offices that comprise the administrative wing of the government. The ninth level which was much larger than any of the levels above and it housed the department of mysteries. The tenth level housed the Wizengamot which was the legislative wing of the government. The eleventh and twelfth level were normally sealed at all times and only maintained by a dedicated staff of house elves under the aegis of the Department of Magical Maintenance. Both levels would serve as a shelter to the common magical population in times of an emergency. Together, the eleventh and twelfth level were much larger than all the other levels put together.

Both the levels had many sublevels and each level had several fireplaces and apparition points which would only be activated when there was a need for rapid evacuation to the shelter. The shelter could comfortably house around ten thousand people if necessary. The entire magical human population of Britain was only slightly larger than twenty thousand. Hogwarts and Hogsmeade, being far enough from any significant muggle population, would provide refuge to those who couldn't fit into the shelter or that was the plan.

Five decades passed since the construction of the shelter and despite remarkable advances in muggle military technology, there had been no further wars in Western Europe at least. As decades passed and new people came into power, the knowledge gained by the previous generations fell to the wayside. Few if any of the general public knew of the existence of the shelter and most of those who did know of its existence did not understand its purpose.

The taskforce formed with initial intent of keeping abreast of muggle technologies still existed, but most of their reports were read only by their immediate superior in the Department of Mysteries and almost never made it above that level of the hierarchy. Wizards who made and executed plans to ensure their survival in the event of even nuclear wars long before even the muggles did were succeeded by those who couldn't even spell 'fire arms' properly.

It was the height of irony that should a nuclear bomb ever explode in London, the people who had the highest chance of survival were the ones who are the most ignorant of such weapons.

Harry slipped out of his rather lengthy musings as he reached the first level of the building and stepped out into a thickly carpeted corridor. This level housed the offices of the minister of magic and his immediate staff and also contained the office of the chief warlock of the wizengamot.

The Offices on this level were markedly larger and more opulent. Harry set off at a brisk pace through the empty corridors. Harry had left Privet Drive early enough that even with all the delays; he arrived at his destination well before 9 AM, which was the start of the working day. He walked almost soundlessly as the thick carpet completely muffled even the minute amount of sound his charmed shoes generated. It took him only a few minutes to find the office of his first target. The plaque on the shiny mahogany door read:

**Dolores Umbridge **

**Senior Undersecretary to the Minister**

Harry whispered an incantation as he cast a revealing charm on the door to check for any spells to deter intruders. Finding none, he quickly slipped into the room and closed the door behind him. The room was remarkably similar to Umbridge's office at Hogwarts and decorated just as sickeningly. Thankfully, the only pictures in the room were of the kittens she seemed so fond of. There were no portraits of witches or wizards to witness what he had come here to do. He walked to a corner waited quietly for his quarry.

He didn't have to wait for long before he heard a high pitched laughter as the door opened and Umbridge walked in, followed by a man he had never met before but immediately recognized as Calhoun Yaxley. Harry could scarcely believe his luck that two of his targets would appear before him with no one else around when he was expecting only Umbridge. But he had to be careful. Taking down two people, one of them a death eater, in the heart of the ministry without raising a ruckus was going to need some delicate handling.

The still tittering Umbridge placed her hideously pink hand bag on the table and sat back in her plushy chair while Yaxley pulled up another chair and sat without being invited. It seemed that Umbridge and Yaxley were well acquainted, as evidenced by the informal nature of their interaction. Yaxley relaxed in his chair as he watched Umbridge fiddle with her handbag.

Harry did not waste any time as he moved quickly and positioned himself less than a foot behind Umbridge's chair, his invisibility cloak and other stealth charms completely hiding his presence. His wand protruded a few inches out of the invisibility cloak as he took careful aim at his former defence teacher's back. Thankfully it was hidden from Yaxley's view by the Backrest of Umbridge's ridiculously high backed chair.

_"Imperio"_ He cast the mind control spell for the second time today, concentrating as he had only a few times in his life, using only the lightest of whispers.

Harry encountered only the barest resistance as he crushed the senior undersecretary's will and took control of her mind. The transformation was so seamless that there was only a split second pause in Umbridge's efforts to search her handbag. He implanted in her mind a series of pre prepared mental commands using legilimency the moment he got her under his control.

Now that he had one of his enemies under his control, he relaxed a little. He then moved slowly from behind Umbridge to the other side of the table, nearer to Yaxley, making his foot falls as light as possible until he was directly behind Yaxley. The look on the blond death eater's face had shifted from conveying amusement to irritation as Umbridge had moved on from her handbag to her desk drawers, still searching furiously and ignoring her guest. In truth Umbridge had already found what she was searching for, a spare bow as her current one was a little crumpled by floo travel, but she ignored it and continued searching under his nonverbal command. As he expected, her behaviour irritated and hence distracted Yaxley. The red jet of a nonverbal stunning spell travelled barely a foot before it struck the unsuspecting death eater.

Yaxley slumped forward in his seat. Harry twisted his wand in an intricate twirl and jabbed it toward Yaxley. Thin but strong ropes burst out of his wand tip and wrapped themselves around each of Yaxley's limbs, fastening them tightly to the chair which held his slumped form. He applied a sticking charm to the chair's backrest followed by a wave of his wand which straightened Yaxley's slumped upper body so that he was sitting upright and stuck to the backrest. Another wave sent the chair gliding smoothly to a corner of the room such that both the chair and the occupant would be hidden from view if anyone were to suddenly barge into the room. A final upward flick of his wand summoned Yaxley's wand from a waist holster hidden within his robes.

With Yaxley temporarily neutralized, Harry turned his attention back to Umbridge who was still merrily pretending to search the room.

"Dolores, is Cornelius in office yet?" Harry asked from within his invisibility cloak.

"No, he had gone to visit that old fool Dumbledore again!" Umbridge said as she turned in the direction of his voice.

Her face twisted into an ugly sneer of contempt as she mentioned the headmaster.

"He wants the old man's help in convincing that troublemaker Potter to support the ministry," She finished, never showing the slightest bit of hesitation at answering the questions of a disembodied voice.

The general perception about the imperius curse was that the victim's will was completely suppressed and he was controlled like a puppet on a string. But that was not completely true. The Imperius was far more insidious than that. A successfully cast imperius would make the victim believe that the caster was his greatest friend and that nothing could go wrong as long as the victim follows all of the casters commands. This would generally force the victim to fulfil the caster's demand to the best of his ability, often using knowledge that was available only to the victim. The function allowed the imperius to be used as an alternative to truth potions in a limited fashion. As long as the caster's questions did not generate any significant conflict in the victim's mind they would answer the question. So Harry had to remain careful not to ask any questions that would lead to Umbridge trying to fight the curse.

Harry's use of first names in addressing both Umbridge and Fudge was merely to provide additional external stimulus to strengthen the illusion of friendship and camaraderie that the imperius curse generated. Voldemort's extensive experience and knowledge of the imperius showed that the most successful and long lived imperius curses were also the ones which generated the least amount of conflict within the victim's psyche. There is always a part of the victim's mind which recognises that it is being controlled. So the user must remain careful to make sure that this part of the mind does not grow strong enough to eclipse the strength of the imperius itself. This can be achieved by periodically renewing the imperius and also avoiding any commands which can cause a victim's mind to rebel.

"When is he going to return to his office?" Harry asked again.

"As soon as he finishes his meeting with that old coot," Umbridge replied.

"Poor Cornelius...everyone is his blaming him for Potter's mischief, It is not his mistake that Potter and his friends destroyed a large portion of the department of mysteries," She continued rambling.

"That's enough! Get on with your work," Harry snapped as he ruthlessly suppressed the urge to curse her and turned back to Yaxley.

A wave of his wand sealed the door to Umbridge's office magically. It is unlikely that anyone would bother Umbridge in her office so early in the day due to her generally unpleasant demeanour, but Harry thought it was better to be safe than sorry.

He pointed his wand at the unconscious Yaxley and a blue wisp of light signifying a nonverbal _'Ennervate' _struck Yaxley returning him to consciousness.

"_Silencio"_ Harry verbalized as robbed the still disoriented Yaxley of his voice.

Harry let the hood of his invisibility cloak fall back as he watched Yaxley try to extricate his limbs from their tight confines. The appearance of his glamoured and disembodied head shocked Yaxley for barely a moment before his face flushed red with fury as the Death Eater tried shouting at him. When that didn't work he tried to lean forward and tip the chair over in order to gain Umbridge's attention.

Harry did not bother to explain the futility of that action to the older wizard as a wave of his wand prevented the chair from tipping over and another flick launched a stinging hex, the pain caused by the hex caused a temporary halt in Death Eater's insistent if rather futile attempts to escape his predicament.

"_Legilimens"_ Harry intoned pointing his wand at the bound older wizard as he looked straight into Yaxley's black eyes with his now brown ones.

At once, Harry was immersed in the Death eater's memories as different images started flying by. It took a few moments before Harry obtained enough control of the process to start sifting through Yaxley's most recent memories. Harry required a few minutes and five iterations of the legilimency spell before he was able to fight through Yaxley's repeated attempts to muster an adequate defence and get all the information he required. Yaxley was skilled enough in occlumency to prevent most legilimens from accessing his thoughts and memories. But Harry's skill at legilimency was comparable to, if only slightly lower than Voldemort's own and the brute force method he employed meant that Yaxley stood barely any chance at keeping him from the information he wanted.

Harry took a few moments to ponder over all the information he gleaned before turning his wand onto Yaxley again.

"_Obliviate"_ Harry murmured, concentrating on erasing the last few minutes from his memories and replacing them with false memories of Umbridge stunning him suddenly halfway through their conversation.

A wave of his wand removed all of Yaxley's bindings and another wave removed the sticking charm on his back causing Yaxley's upper body to slump forward. And then Harry summoned a hideous looking quill from Umbridge's desk and transfigured it into and black box with a tight lid and a few tiny holes on its sides.

"_Mutatio Mus"_ He intoned clearly as he twirled his wand in an intricate pattern and pointed it at the unconscious Death Eater. The slumped Death Eater's body folded in on itself and shrunk until only a screeching white rat remained in his place. The pain of the forced transfiguration broke the stunning spell and the newly awakened Yaxley panicked at the abrupt change in his body. Harry summoned the rat before it could escape and knocked it out once more with a silent stunner and then put it inside the conjured box and sealed the lid closed.

Harry placed the box on Umbridge's table, gave her a few instructions and exited her office to head towards his next target.

The office of the Minister for Magic lay deeper inside the labyrinth of corridors that made up the first level. Harry had to carefully navigate his in order to avoid running into the dozen or so assistants and secretaries who passed by him in the corridor.

The corridor opened into a large office which had ten work desks a few of which were occupied. Harry slowly walked past them to the door that led to Fudge's personal office. He couldn't open the door without alerting the staffers who were seated barely a few feet away. But he had accounted for their presence and planned accordingly. He had to wait a few more minutes before Umbridge waddled into the room carrying a folder. She stopped briefly to give a few instructions to one of her underlings before she opened the door to the minister's personal office and went inside. Harry slipped in behind her and watched her place the folder on the Minster's table, leave the room and close the door behind her.

It was the first time he had been inside the Minister's office and even Voldemort never had a need to visit the place. Harry had expected it to be lavish and extravagant. Even so, he was still surprised by the sheer opulence it exuded. The office was very large and every inch of it was covered by a highly polished dark wood. The edges of the wood panels were covered by beautifully engraved gold plating. The floor was covered in a rich red carpet. Fudge's monstrous work desk was situated in the centre of the room and surrounded by half a dozen extremely well made wooden chairs. A large crystal chandelier hung in the centre of the high ceiling. A large book shelf dominated the far wall behind Fudge's chair and a large fire place covered a part of the left wall. But it was not the book shelf or the fireplace which caught Harry's interest. It was the small door that was conveniently placed right beside the fireplace. Harry was reasonably sure that the door led to Fudge's private bathroom. It was the only place where Harry would be able to ambush Fudge without alerting the portraits on the wall or any security that the minister arranged for his personal protection. Harry saw three portraits in the room. Luckily none of them had a proper view of the bathroom door. As long he remained quiet they would not be any wiser to his presence.

But before he could enter the bathroom and lay in wait, he had to make sure that Fudge would utilize the bathroom after he comes into his office. So he placed a mild bowel loosening hex on fudge's chair before he entered the bathroom and closed its door. Now he had to wait until Fudge returned before he would be able to initiate the most important part of his plan.

Harry had originally decided that he would get rid of Dumbledore before Voldemort because to him Dumbledore posed more of a threat. But just because Dumbledore was the larger threat, it did not mean that Voldemort wasn't a big threat himself. Especially since all of his Death Eaters and other sympathisers were also his enemies. The Order of the Phoenix on the other hand could become valuable allies if he played his cards right. So before he could concentrate on Dumbledore, he had to make sure that Voldemort did not take over the ministry. To do that Harry had to cripple Voldemort's forces by removing most of his hard core supporters in the employ of the ministry or the ones who had undue influence on the ministry.

The current political situation provided Harry with a unique opportunity to cripple the Dark Lord. Fudge was barely hanging on to power, trying desperately to turn the tides and retain his position. But unfortunately for him, all his supporters had abandoned him. He became a political untouchable. The rest of the powerful people in the ministry had hunkered down and were trying to stay out of the limelight until Fudge was kicked out. They would no doubt come out of their holes once fudge was finally kicked out and start squabbling for power.

Dumbledore and his faction too would probably wait until Fudge was kicked out and then try to install one of their supporters as the minister. Voldemort on the other hand would be in a slightly disadvantageous position because he was not fully prepared for the ministry to acknowledge his resurrection and hence he was not in an ideal position to take advantage of the chaos and pitch his own candidate to the position of the Minister. In addition, Lucius Malfoy, his most influential supporter in the ministry had gotten himself imprisoned along with ten other veteran Death Eaters.

So Voldemort would try his damndest to eliminate anyone who could prove to be an effective deterrent in the position of the minister. As of now Amelia Bones was the most popular person for the post of the Minister. Unfortunately for her, she was a staunch enemy of Voldemort and not a hardcore supporter of Dumbledore. Her popularity and relative political independence meant that her death was highly desirable to both Dumbledore and Voldemort. So there was a good probability that she would end up dead like a large part of her family before her. Harry had no intention of allowing this to happen.

For Harry, Madam Bones was the best possible person in the chair of the minister. She was competent and had a reputation for ruthlessness when it was called for. So once she becomes the minister it is likely that she would divert a large part of Voldemort's and Dumbledore's attention from him and give him more freedom to move unnoticed.

So Harry had decided to use Fudge to clear the path for Bones and purge the ministry of Death Eaters and other Voldemort sympathisers. In his attempts to silence Harry and Dumbledore, Fudge had rammed a modification to a law through the wizengamot with the help of Lucius Malfoy last summer. The law concerned his ability to write and enforce ministerial decrees. The original law allowed the Minister for Magic to issue decrees, but they can be repealed by the wizengamot immediately if they found them to be unpalatable. Fudge's modification mandated a period of one month since the decree had been issued before the wizengamot could repeal it.

Harry remembered reading about the law in the Daily Prophet. At the time he didn't understand its significance. Even with Malfoy's support the law passed with only a slight majority. The wizengamot was uncomfortable in allowing the minister to have any more power. Fudge forced Dumbledore out from his position as the chief warlock using the same law. Of course, if Dumbledore wanted, he could have fought his removal through various avenues available to him. But Harry suspected that Dumbledore let Fudge kick him out so that when Voldemort's return was eventually accepted, Dumbledore would have more leverage with the ministry since the public would be more sympathetic to him. Possibly enough leverage to push his preferred candidate into the position of the minister.

Harry wanted to use this not so well thought out law to his own advantage before either it or Fudge were replaced. The decrees Harry intended to force Fudge to issue would probably horrify the wizengamot. By law, they had to wait a month before the decree could be repealed. But they could always repeal the law itself before they repealed the decree. But repealing a law requires a tedious and time taking procedure. Harry estimated that he would have three days before the wizengamot clamped down on Fudge. But three days was enough time to do a lot of damage.

Harry stood in the corner of the bathroom and used occlumency to mentally prepare a list of the instructions he would force on Fudge. It took another hour of waiting in silence and battling a wandering mind and aches in his legs before Harry heard the characteristic whoosh of floo travel. Harry heard three whooshes in quick succession signifying that three people entered the office through the fireplace. This he assumed was Fudge and his guards. Harry checked to see if his cloak was covering every part of him before he tightened his grip on his wand and waited for Fudge to enter the bathroom.

Not even a minute passed before the bathroom door slammed open, startling Harry enough that his wand poked out of the cloak. The carpet in Fudge's office muffled footsteps enough that he did not have forewarning of Fudge's quick approach. But luckily, the turmoil in his bowels seemed to have distracted Fudge enough that he did not notice the wand before Harry pulled it back inside the cloak.

Harry aimed his wand at Fudge's back and softly whispered _"Imperio"_ casting the unforgivable for the third and hopefully final time that day. Fudge like Umbridge before him provided barely any resistance to his curse. Harry used the mental connection that formed between him and Fudge courtesy of the imperius curse to implant the instructions in his victim's mind. With the most difficult part of his job completed, Harry waited for fudge to empty his bowels and go back to his office and start executing his commands.

Harry intended to wait in the bathroom till the end of the day despite the fact that being in the portly politician's vicinity disgusted him. Despite how pliable Fudge seemed to be to the imperius, there is still a good probability that he could try to break free or at least resist a little. The strength of an imperius decreases with the number of people the caster tries to control simultaneously. While individually, neither Fudge nor Umbridge had the ability to break free from his imperius, there is a possibility of them trying to throw off the curse when his attention is diverted solely to one of them. There was far less danger of Umbridge breaking free because all the commands he gave her were innocuous enough individually to not alarm her subconscious self. But in Fudge's case his commands were far more unpalatable and hence Harry needed to remain close to Fudge to renew the imperius if and when necessary.

A few minutes later, Fudge left the bathroom, leaving the door slightly open to allow Harry to listen in on the conversations that are going to take place in the office. Harry had no fear of anyone other than Fudge barging in to the bathroom since it was solely for the minister's use.

* * *

Cornelius Fudge was having a really bad fortnight. He had previously had an unwavering belief in the death of He-who-must-not-be-named in spite of all the warnings of Dumbledore and the Potter boy and that belief came to bite him in the arse when all the aforementioned characters broke into the ministry with a score of other witches and wizards and wrecked a large part of the Department of Mysteries. He had been so sure that Dumbledore had been after his position that seeing the Dark Lord alive and kicking had immediately thrown him into a haze of horrified disbelief and confusion. Things became clear only when he learned that Lucius Malfoy had been one of the Death Eaters captured by Dumbledore.

He had realized then that he had been utterly duped by the person he considered be a close ally and friend. Lucius had always supported him and helped in all his time as a minister. When Fudge had first been introduced the wealthy younger wizard shortly after his ascension to the position of the minister, he had been wary but welcoming. He was not so stupid as to believe that Malfoy had truly been under the imperius curse, but he was also not stupid enough spurn the patronage of a wizard as rich and powerful as Malfoy.

He had always known that Lucius had been a willing follower of He-who-must-not-be-named. Lucius himself had admitted to his culpability in what Fudge thought was a drunken reverie but now recognized to be a ploy to earn Fudge's trust, and it worked. Lucius had slowly wormed his way into Fudge's inner circle and became his closest informal advisor through generous campaign donations and political support. Fudge had whole heartedly believed that while Lucius had been a willing ally of He-who-must-not-be-named, he had truly regretted his decision to join such an insane and dangerous wizard. That is also why Fudge had so readily believed that Dumbledore was after his job when Lucius had suggested it.

Once he had realized his folly he had immediately gone to Dumbledore. He knew that only Dumbledore's and Potter's support could help him retain his position. But Dumbledore had flatly refused his request and even prevented him from meeting young Harry Potter despite the fact that he had been willing to offer a lot of concessions to Dumbledore and his Order of the Phoenix. It seemed that now Dumbledore truly wanted him gone so that he could install someone more to his liking. So Fudge had gone from being a popular Minister of Magic to a political leper in a matter of a few days. He had finally exhausted his last avenue of support.

But Cornelius Fudge was not done fighting. Somehow, despite being in the worst possible position, he felt as if all his burdens had been lifted. Being abandoned by all his allies had also freed him from all his shackles. The note that Dolores left along with the folder gave him the only piece of good news he had in weeks. As he sat on the toilet to relieve his bowels from a sudden and strange bout of diarrhoea, a lot of disparate pieces of information that had been floating around in his mind coalesced to form a tentative plan to extricate himself from his sticky situation. If his plan worked, he would be seen as an effective and strong willed minister who fought and won against dangerous foes despite being betrayed by people he trusted. So, Cornelius Fudge left the bathroom with renewed spirits to give the orders necessary to put his plan in action.

Dawlish and Williamson, the Aurors deputed to be his personal guard had already left his office to man their positions outside.

"Dawlish! Get in here," Fudge called.

"I have a small task for you," said Fudge as soon a Dawlish entered his office and closed the door behind him.

He walked over to his table and sat down in his large chair, looking at the Auror standing rigidly at attention.

"I need you to inform Amelia Bones and Rufus Scrimgeour to come to my office in thirty minutes and do so quietly, don't let anyone else know of the meeting and tell both Bones and Scrimgeour to be discreet," He said.

"Yes Minister Fudge," Dawlish said.

"Send Williamson in after you," He added before he made a slight hand gesture to dismiss Dawlish and took out a piece of blank parchment while he waited for the other auror to enter his office.

"Williamson, I want you to go down the Auror office and requisition a vial of Veritaserum," said the minister as he scribbled on the parchment.

"This is the requisition order," Fudge continued as he signed the parchment and passed it on to the auror.

"Be quick and do it discreetly and on your way down tell Madam Umbridge to come to my office," He finished.

The auror gave a curt nod before he left to execute his orders. The note Umbridge left along with a folder of his daily briefs had intimated him that Dolores had found out that Yaxley was a death eater and that she had somehow managed to capture him. The capture of a death eater so high up in the ministry, especially one that had never been caught or suspected before by one of his close allies was remarkably good news. At first he had intended to immediately publicize the capture. But he now had a better idea; he wanted to use Yaxley to net in all the other death eaters and other you-know-who supporters among the ministry's ranks. Their capture and punishment would restore public confidence in him which would in turn allow him to retain his position.

Unfortunately, an operation to capture so many death eaters required a lot of resources and that meant enlisting both the head of the DMLE and the head auror. Fudge did not trust either of them. He knew that both of them were waiting for an opportunity to ascend to the position of the minister. But he had no choice. He needed their cooperation. So he resigned himself to bringing them in. But he would also keep a close eye on them and make sure they didn't subvert his efforts to their own gain.

Just then his office door opened and Dolores strode in carrying what appeared to be a black box.

"Dolores!" exclaimed Fudge.

"Just the person I wanted to see...I read your note..." Fudge trailed off suggestively waiting for her to explain.

"Yes Minister, this morning, while I was waiting for a lift down in the atrium, Yaxley approached me and struck up a conversation about the goings on at the ministry," Dolores said.

"I have spoken to him spoken to him countless times before about various issues regarding the ministry... He seemed to be a good sort of wizard, This time he seemed unusually interested about you...but I thought nothing of it at the time," she continued.

"He entered the lift along with me and pushed the button to the first level and that was when I saw it...the dark mark... his sleeve had fallen back by mistake... He covered it up quickly and I pretended that I didn't notice anything," the senior undersecretary continued weaving a fanciful tale, encouraged by the supportive presence in her mind.

"I managed to keep my wits about me and invited him to my office... ostensibly to continue our conversation... as I had done many times before... he did not suspect anything and once in my office I managed to catch him by surprise and stun him," She finished.

"And where is he now?" Fudge asked eagerly, unable to stop the excitement from showing in his voice.

"He is in here," Dolores said, holding up the box.

"I transfigured him into a rat to transport him easily... though i had to stun him again as the transfiguration broke the previous stunning spell," she said, smiling at the incredulous look on Fudge's face.

"Serves him well... Well done Dolores!" Fudge said with a satisfied look on his face.

"I have a plan, Yaxley could be very useful to us," He continued.

"What do you need me to do," the senior undersecretary asked in an eager tone.

"First let us undo the transfiguration on him and bind him to that chair," Fudge said pointing to a chair beside Dolores.

"I called Bones and Scrimgeour to a meeting, I will need them for what I am going to do and I want you to tell them exactly what you told me," The minister ordered as he palmed his wand and walked around his desk to help Dolores bind the prisoner.

Fudge watched as Dolores opened the box and dumped an unconscious white rat onto the floor. She pointed her wand at the deceptively harmless looking animal and stunned it once more for good measure before both Fudge and Dolores pointed their wands at the unconscious rat, uttered the incantation in unison and undid the transfiguration. Where once was a tiny white rat, now lay a large unconscious man. Thankfully the stunning spell seemed to have held. They levitated him into a chair and bound him in an upright position.

Twenty minutes later, his office held seven people, one unconscious and six awake, four of whom were staring at the unconscious person. Dawlish and Williamson returned a few minutes ago having completed their assigned tasks, shortly followed by Bones and Scrimgeour.

Both the senior DMLE officials had puzzled expressions on their faces. They had probably expected another useless meeting where he demanded that they make some progress in thwarting you-know-who while they made useless excuses in order to explain their inability to do so. He motioned for Dolores to explain the situation to them while he retreated to his chair and started drafting a decree required to put his plan in motion.

He watched Dolores explain the situation to the others. After the explanation both Bones and Scrimgeour had some doubts regarding her story. But Dolores put them to rest admirably. Fudge knew that their so called clarifications were merely attempts to poke holes in Dolores' story. Both Scrimgeour and Bones were after his position, so it was to be expected that they wouldn't be too happy with anything that could help him remain in power. But Fudge had neither the time nor the patience to put up with their antics. His irritation spiked quickly as he watched Bones poke Yaxley's dark mark with her wand for the umpteenth time, seemingly determined to find something wrong with it.

"Enough!" Fudge bellowed silencing the others.

"Finding and capturing one of you-know-who's followers so easily is an unexpected bit of good luck, Especially since he is a senior ministry employee and as such would probably know a lot about other followers and supporters both inside and outside the ministry," Fudge said laying out his reasoning.

"I have a plan which would allow us to take the greatest amount of advantage of the circumstances, We have to move quickly and quietly to achieve the greatest amount of surprise possible and hence deal the greatest possible damage to you-know-who," He concluded the speech which he had been rehearsing in his mind since he first learned of Yaxley's capture.

Bones and Scrimgeour did not look too convinced, but he did not let that deter him. He pulled a stack of fresh parchment and a dicta-quill from his desk drawers and activated the dicta-quill and left it hovering over the parchment.

"Williamson! Wake up the prisoner and administer the Veritaserum," He ordered.

Bones looked at him in surprise and protested as he had expected her to.

"Minister! It is against the law to administer Veritaserum without the consent of the person..." She said before being cut off by fudge.

"I know, But as I said several times before...Laws can be changed...This is a ministerial decree I just drafted and signed, which gives the ministry the right to interrogate a suspected Death Eater under Veritaserum should there exist a reasonable cause to believe that the suspect is indeed a Death Eater," He said holding up a sheet of high quality parchment.

"I believe the dark mark on Yaxley's arm is reasonable cause?" he queried, to which bones reluctantly agreed. Scrimgeour on the other hand seemed to have no qualms with feeding veritaserum to the Death Eater.

"Administer the veritaserum Williamson," prodded Fudge.

Dawlish stepped forward and lifted the stunning spell from the unconscious Yaxley. Before the obviously confused Yaxley could do anything more than look around in bewilderment, Dawlish forcibly wrenched open his mouth. Williamson then stepped forward and carefully tipped the uncorked vial of transparent potion above Yaxley's mouth and let a few drops of the powerful liquid fall into it. Once enough of the potion had been administered, Williamson re-corked the vial and slipped it inside his pocket and Dawlish released his grip on Yaxley's face.

Fudge tapped the dicta-quill with his wand and looked at Yaxley, whose eyes had gone slightly hazy, a characteristic of Veritaserum ingestion. It was time to start the interrogation.

"What is your name?" asked Fudge.

"Calhoun Reginald Mordred Yaxley" replied the Death Eater.

"Are you a Death Eater?" queried Fudge.

"Yes, I am," replied Yaxley.

"How long have you been a servant of you-know-who?" asked Fudge.

"Twenty two years," was the reply, eliciting looks of surprise from almost everyone.

"What is your intention behind striking up a conversation with Dolores Umbridge this morning?" queried Fudge.

"The Dark Lord had ordered me to gain information on anyone who could potentially become the next minister of magic now that Fudge is on his way out and the details of their residences, family and friends." replied Yaxley eliciting pale faces and muttered curses.

Fudge was no fool; he asked the earlier question already knowing the answer would be something along those lines. Nothing gets people working better than a threat to their lives after all.

"Who are the people that you think have the chance to be the next minister?" continued Fudge.

"Amelia Bones, Rufus Scrimgeour and probably Amos Diggory," replied the Death Eater.

"What is you-know-who planning to do to these people?" queried Fudge.

"He is going to kill them or have them killed," Replied Yaxley.

The answer did not elicit much of a reaction from Bones or Scrimgeour to Fudge's slight disappointment. But both of them already knew intimately what fate awaited anyone who was targeted by you-know-who through copious personal experience.

And so the interrogation continued. They learned that the assassinations of Bones and Emmeline Vance were very close to being executed and that Florean Fortescue and the wand maker Ollivander also held you-know-who's interest. They managed to get the names of most if not all of you-know-who's marked and unmarked followers and other supporters in the ministry and quite a few other names of people who were not employed by the ministry. They found the locations of a few Death Eater safe houses and also learned that you-know-who made the Malfoy manor in Wiltshire his current residence. Yaxley was a fountain of information and all that valuable information was catalogued word for word by the dicta-quill. Once the interrogation was completed Yaxley was hit by three different stunning spells from the DMLE officials, only Dawlish held back. Yaxley's casual admission of helping plan the murders of their colleagues seemed to have riled up some tempers.

"We seem have a lot of information and we have to figure out how to utilize it properly," proclaimed Fudge as he waved his wand and uttered a spell causing the dicta-quill to start making additional copies of all the information it previously recorded.

"We have to capture and interrogate these people first; especially the ones in the ministry, you-know-who would never let one Death Eater know all his plans, no matter how trusted he may be," came the predictable reply from Scrimgeour, the paranoid auror, and Bones seemed to be in agreement if the look on her face was anything to go by.

"You are right of course," Fudge agreed.

"But if we start cursing people inside the ministry in the middle of the day, we will cause a panic and tip off the enemy... and then... They would take precautions... and most of our knowledge would go to waste... We need to make the most efficient use of the knowledge we have," said Fudge, eliciting frowns of disagreement from both Bones and Scrimgeour. But Fudge ignored them and continued making his point.

"We need to take down all the ministry employees on the list first, but we must do it quietly, like Dolores had done with Yaxley, start with the ones in your departments first. Choose three or four people you trust the most, whom you are really sure cannot be supporters of you-know-who and instruct them to capture each of the people on the list individually when they are alone, like when they are in bathrooms or some other isolated places, we need to outnumber them and also take them down without warning to prevent them from raising any ruckus, if anyone else sees you taking these people down, obliviate them immediately, knowledge of the take downs must be kept an absolute secret for as long as possible," He said.

"I want all the twelve ministry employees on the list captured before the end of the workday, for the people in your departments, call them individually to your offices and then capture them, after you take them down, transfigure them into small animals and transfer them immediately to Azkaban to await trial, We can interrogate them later at our leisure." He continued, suppressing a smile as he watched Bones and Scrimgeour listen to his plan in disbelief clear on their faces.

"Once the ministry employees are dealt with, work on the remaining ones. We can get their addresses from the records. Make teams of four people with a minimum of two aurors on each team and have them attack these people in the dead of the night. Don't go after heavily warded manors or houses. Go after the ones with lesser protections first. I want as many raids as possible tonight as we cannot contain this beyond today," He ordered.

"You seem to have put a lot of thought into this," Suggested Bones with suspicion tingeing her voice as if she expected all of this to be some bizarre plot he engineered, spiking his irritation again.

But he suppressed the irritation for the sake of his plan. It was time to pretend some humility.

"Yes I have... While the capture of Yaxley was an unexpected stroke of good fortune, I had been toying around with this plan in mind for a few days. While I did not know that Yaxley was a Death Eater, I did suspect a few of the people on this list... My friendship with Malfoy and the trust I put in him had been the biggest mistakes I have ever made... I believed all his lies and that caused irreparable harm to the ministry. But the one upside to being so close to Malfoy was that I knew a few other people at the ministry who were much closer to him than I was and now that I think back to several previously innocuous seeming occasions they were good indications of their support for you-know-who. If Yaxley had not been found out now, I would have still had them captured and interrogated and used any information gained in the same manner I am now proposing," He confessed, portraying both remorse for his mistakes and resolve to see through the course of action he was proposing.

"This decree will give you the power to capture and interrogate any suspected Death Eater provided that there is good enough cause for said suspicion. If anyone resists capture the aurors have the permission to use lethal force including the unforgivable to take down the death eater," Fudge said.

"That wizengamot will not let that decree stand. They will repeal it immediately," said Scrimgeour.

"I know, but they have to wait at least thirty days from the date of issuance of a ministerial decree before they can repeal it. To repeal it early they will have to overturn the law which mandates the wait period and overturning a law requires at least three days at the barest minimum, by which time, we will have completed the Veritaserum interrogations and acquired all the proof we need to convict the captured Death Eaters. The wizengamot may overturn the decree but they cannot invalidate the arrests or the proofs we will obtain," Fudge said.

"So your aurors and MLE patrol may not retain their special powers for long, but they will retain them long enough to deliver a large blow to you-know-who's forces," he continued.

"Also I think it is better if all of us change our residences permanently. Both of you are already on you-know-who's hit list and after today, I will be too. I think it is better if we take up residence in places no one else knows about," Fudge advised his subordinates.

"I think it is time for us to put my plan in motion. I want all twelve of the people on the ministry list in Azkaban by evening and also capture as many of the rest as you can by tomorrow morning. Go on now and keep me updated," Said Fudge and ushered Bones and Scrimgeour out after giving them copies of the interrogation transcript.

"Dawlish, Williamson, Remove all of Yaxley's belongings, put him under an anti-disapparition jinx and transport him to Azkaban immediately. Keep him unconscious until you throw him into a cell and do all this discreetly. Afterwards, report to Scrimgeour," He said and waited until they transported Yaxley via his floo to prepare him for jail before he turned to his undersecretary with a smile.

"Thank you Dolores. Your actions have given me a fantastic choice to fight against both Dumbledore and you-know-who. If they think I will simply slink away into obscurity, they have another thing coming," He proclaimed as he relaxed into his comfortable high backed chair with a tired but satisfied sigh.

"It is a pity that so many fine pureblood wizards are helping an outlaw plot against the ministry, "said Dolores with a strange expression on her face.

It took a moment for Fudge to place the expression on Dolores's face as sadness. Fudge had only ever seen glee, anger, disgust, malice and hatred on her face. He had never seen her sad.

"There is nothing we can do Dolores. May be a stint in Azkaban would set them straight," he suggested, recognizing the fact that the quite a few names on their list were people whom Dolores knew personally and liked.

"Maybe they were even threatened or forced into following you-know-who. If so, it will come out during the interrogation and we can pardon them," He reassured her

Fudge knew that unlike him, Dolores took pureblood superiority very seriously. If it wasn't for her fanatical loyalty to the ministry, he would have suspected her of being a follower of you-know-who. He reassured her that what they were doing was right and sent her on her way. Now he just had to wait for the progress reports from his subordinates. He knew that while both Bones and Scrimgeour coveted the post of the minister and so would love for him to be thrown out of his position; they still would obey his orders. Especially since the success of this operation would cripple you-know-who and hence indirectly reinforce their personal security.

* * *

Amelia Bones had just walked out of what was probably the most surreal meeting she had ever had with Cornelius Fudge. She was still trying to wrap her head around everything she had learned in the meeting when she collapsed in a chair in her office along with Scrimgeour.

"I have always wondered how he managed to become the minister of magic. Who knew he had such a shrewd mind," said Scrimgeour, his voice carefully neutral.

"It will not work," she said, shaking her head.

"Even if we capture all the people in this list and obtain confessions from them. It will still not be enough to allow him to remain as minister," She concluded.

"Why do you think so?" asked Scrimgeour.

"All these people have families and friends who have a large amount of influence both in the wizengamot and the public and they will all turn against him rabidly and even the factions who oppose you-know-who would be very uncomfortable with such a ham handed approach," Amelia said.

"The common public may actually like his approach. Remember how popular crouch was?" countered Scrimgeour.

"That was different, Crouch was popular because he genuinely hated you-know-who and his ilk and worked hard to eradicate them. Fudge on the other hand is just desperate to stay in power. This latest move by Fudge may appeal to some really thick morons, but the majority of the public and more importantly opinion makers in all camps will see right through i,t" she concluded

"What about us then? What effect would this have on us?" Scrimgeour continued curiously.

"Minimal if we play this right. We would just be following orders," She said

"But this would cause all the darker oriented factions to coalesce and unify. Even the wizards and witches who are not all that enamoured with you-know-who would band together into a single faction and that may cause us difficulties in the election," suggested Scrimgeour.

"Maybe, but what can we do about it?" queried Amelia watching her colleague and competitor carefully wondering where he was going with this.

Scrimgeour took a deep breath and said "I want you to support me."

"If we can stick together under a single banner we would avoid splitting up votes and Dumbledore would also be forced to support us because together we have the best credentials," he continued.

"You are asking me to drop out of the race and back you. Shouldn't it be the other way around considering that I am better known than you are?" Amelia said

"What you say is true," Scrimgeour acknowledged.

"But you would do far more good in your current position with a supportive minister of magic than in the position of minister yourself," He said.

"Especially since the next in line to take your place if you are promoted is Thicknesse and I don't think I need to tell you how dangerous that could be. He is very well connected, but he is also a big liability especially since some of his connections include some of these charming people on our list. For me, the replacement would be Robards and he is competent and would work well with you," Scrimgeour continued. Still, Amelia was not convinced.

"Amelia, you would make a very good minister during wartime or peace. I on the other hand would not be a good peace time minister. Whichever of us becomes the minister would be a prime target for you-know-who and if this war takes an ugly turn and I happen to die, you would be an excellent and probably unchallenged replacement," He continued.

"But if our positions were reversed and you die in the seat of the minister then I would have to compete with the likes of Thicknesse for the post of minister and we cannot predict the outcome of that scenario. Support me now and I will in turn give you my complete support for your bid after the war," He appealed to her.

Amelia had to admit that Scrimgeour's reasoning was sound. She knew that Scrimgeour was ambitious, but so was she and if she refused his proposal it could damage their working relationship. Giving up a chance to become the minister of magic was not something to take lightly and normally she would have taken her time to think about his proposal, but time was the one thing they had an acute shortage of.

"Very well Rufus, I will support you now and I expect complete reciprocation in the future," She said giving in to plea and bringing a relieved smile to Scrimgeour's face.

Scrimgeour was right in that she would definitely have other chances to become the minister and she was also younger than her colleague and she could afford to wait a few more years.

"Thank you Amelia, we will discuss this later, I think we should start planning the capture of the people now, we only have until evening," said scrimgeour, bringing up his copy of the interrogation transcript.

And so they did, they brought in a few aurors they trusted and somehow managed to capture all the twelve ministry employed supporters of you-know-who, seven of whom were Amelia and Srimgeour's direct subordinates. Some they simply called in for meetings before stunning them and carting them away and others required more careful handling. As Fudge expected, they had a few close calls where they had to obliviate a few people who happened to witness the takedowns.

By Five PM all twelve suspects have been carted off to Azkaban and said fact was relayed to Fudge in a carefully worded memo. Neither of them wanted to inform Fudge in person and watch him gloat at his perceived victory and they also had to make up different excuses to the families of the captured people who wouldn't be returning home after the end of the workday. And finally it was time to bring more aurors and other members of magical law enforcement patrol in on the operation for the night raids. They weren't of course informed of the already captured Death Eaters and Amelia and Scrimgeour took great care to keep all the information on a need to know basis. Each team was informed of only their specific targets and were ordered to keep the information confidential.

* * *

Harry listened in quiet amusement as the drama played out in Fudge's office more or less according to his predictions. The only hiccup was when the connection forged by the Imperius between him and Umbridge came to the brink of being unravelled during Yaxley's interrogation, when he was giving out names of the Death Eaters. One of the names she heard obviously caused some form of flare up in her psyche. Harry found that very interesting. He waited until everyone left and carefully entered Umbridge's office when no one was looking.

"What worries you Dolores?" He asked the senior undersecretary who appeared less agitated now that the Imperius curse had the time to reassert itself after the minor flare up.

The question, appearing as it did from thin air had startled her for a brief moment before the Imperius did its job and forced Umbridge to converse with an invisible voice as if it was a common occurrence.

"It is Selwyn... He is my cousin," She said hesitantly and Harry understood her problem immediately.

"Ah... I understand. Maybe Yaxley was mistaken," He started consolingly.

"But Just in case, I think it is better if you warn him. He is not a ministry employee, so according to the plan, he will only be attacked after midnight, you can floo him from your home after work and warn him," He advised.

Umbridge's relation to Selwyn was an unforeseen but fortunate coincidence. For his plan to work he needed another Death Eater as a patsy. Harry had already fixed his sights on a few dim-witted followers of you-know-who. Anyone of them would have been fine for his purpose, and he originally intended to locate one of them and capture them immediately after leaving the ministry. But now he could use Umbridge to lure Selwyn directly into his grasp and make things easy for him. In a way, Selwyn was a better replacement to the ones he originally wanted. He was a veteran Death Eater, but he was not particularly bright or talented. The only thing that made him valuable to Voldemort was that he was rich and the Selwyn family was very old and hence well respected in certain circles.

He gave a few new instructions to Umbridge and made his way back to Fudge's office. And then came the waiting, he had to spend the next few hours in Fudge's bathroom in silence while battling hunger and boredom. Finally, after what seemed like a life time, Fudge received the news that the first phase of the plan was completed as smoothly as possible. Now came the next phase, while Bones and Scrimgeour would be directing the raids on the houses of the known supporters of you-know-who, Fudge would start the second phase by himself. It was time for Fudge to make his final trip to Azkaban.

Harry waited for Fudge to make another trip to the bathroom and reinforced the Imperius curse before giving additional instructions. Harry needed the curse to be strong enough to maintain its hold even during Fudge's exposure to whatever dementors still remained in Azkaban and make him follow all of Harry's instructions, which would be very unpalatable to the minister and hence could make Fudge fight harder than before. Harry himself could not go to Azkaban along with Fudge. So, he made the Imperius curse as strong as possible before sending Fudge away.

After sending Fudge away Harry left the minister's office and stealthily made his way back out of the ministry and back to his room at Privet Drive. He stuffed his Invisibility cloak and other wizarding attire in his trunk and removed his disguises before he went to see his aunt.

He found her in the sitting room, watching some revolting show on the telly with an almost manic concentration. Neither Vernon nor Dudley seemed to be home yet.

"Hello Aunt Petunia," He greeted her, startling her out of her reverie.

"Come back, have you?" Petunia turned towards him, her mouth twisted into a grimace.

"I am starving. I am going make myself another sandwich if you don't mind," he said, Ignoring Petunia's question.

"By the way, did anyone ask for me?" he queried, turning towards her.

As soon as they made eye contact, he scanned her surface thoughts and knew her answer before she verbalized it.

"No! None of your freak friends have come here and I hope it stays that way," She said in a warning tone.

"Vernon will not tolerate any more of their nonsense."

"They will stay away as long as you behave yourselves," He replied, and proceeded to make himself a large sandwich and the eat it while ignoring all the nasty looks she sent his way.

After he satiated his hunger, he went out for a short walk even though he was very tired. Appearing outside at least once or twice a day would keep his minders happy and prevent them from looking in on his activities too closely.

He rested for a few hours and then after his relatives had fallen asleep, he reapplied all his disguise and stealth charms and snuck out under the invisibility cloak. It was time for the finishing touch.

* * *

Cornelius Fudge stood inside a tiny room near the offices of the tiny human security complement placed on the island of Azkaban. He had brought four rookies from the magical law enforcement patrol and almost all of the ministry's remaining stock of Veritaserum along with him. The magical law enforcement patrol members had only recently finished their training and hence were too inexperienced to go on any of the raids. He had borrowed them from Bones to help interrogate the twelve recently captured supporters of you-know-who.

He watched as each of the prisoners confessed to their crimes under the truth potion, crimes which varied from spying or practice of minor dark magic to murder. They gave up the many other names, most of which were already given out by Yaxley. The interrogation took several hours even with four Death Eaters being simultaneously questioned in four different rooms. In the end, it turned out that each and every one of them was guilty.

Once all the interrogations were completed, he had sent the four MLE officials back to the ministry along with the safely sealed interrogation transcripts. He had remained behind to render judgement.

Along with the eleven Death Eaters Dumbledore and his people captured, Azkaban was now home to twenty four Death Eaters. The largest number the prison held at any single time. These people were not only murderers but also traitors. He had personally known a lot of them and they had all betrayed him. He knew that even with all the proof they had collected a few of them would go free due to a variety of reasons. The rest would be convicted and imprisoned, but you-know-who would break them out sooner or later. He seemed to be very good at doing that. Even if he did not break them out, as unlikely as that was, Azkaban itself was not enough punishment for these scum, especially with so few dementors remaining on the island.

All of Fudge's effort would be for naught if they broke out soon after imprisonment. The public would be even more unforgiving than they were now. So, he had to appear strong and decisive and the only way to do that was to make sure none the captured prisoners ever returned to you-know-who's side again. The wizengamot may not like what he was about to do, but the public would definitely support him. He only needed to remember Crouch's popularity during the first war to know that he was right.

He did not see any of Azkaban's long term human staff as he made his way to the cells of the prisoners. They probably assumed he had left along with the MLE officials. He paused for a bit and conjured a patronus to protect him in case the few remaining dementors suddenly turned against him. He stopped once he reached Lucius Malfoy's cell. To Fudge's unvoiced delight, he found a dementor standing guard outside of Malfoy's door. The bastard deserved it. He vaguely remembered one of the new prisoners mentioning that you-know-who was not all that pleased with Malfoy during his interrogation. Maybe that was why this dementor remained behind to torment the blond wizard even as most of its brethren left to do you-know-who's bidding. He had to be very careful if that was indeed the case. His plan depended heavily on the few remaining dementors obeying him.

The vile creature shied away from the glow of his sheep patronus and moved away from the cell door.

"Open the door," He ordered the creature.

The dementor glided forward and unlocked the door with a key it had removed from inside its dark cloak and pushed it open with its rotting gray hands. The heavy metal slammed back with a loud bang as the dementor once again moved far away from the vicinity of his patronus. Good, it still seemed to be obeying his orders. He walked closer to the door and peered inside. The glow from his patronus was enough to illuminate the small room.

"Hello Lucius, you are looking well," said Fudge with pronounced sneer on his face.

Malfoy looked anything but well. It had only been a fortnight since he had been captured and even less since he had been imprisoned. But he looked like he had been in prison for much longer. His once impeccably conditioned and groomed hair was an untidy mess and there were dark bags under his eyes in addition to an untidy beard. Maybe because Fudge had always seen him very well groomed, the changes were so startling to him.

"Fudge!? ...What do you want?" Malfoy's voice was scratchy, probably from being unused for so many days.

"I don't want anything from you... I came here to deliver the sentence for your crimes," Fudge couldn't suppress a note of glee from his voice.

"Sentence me? I have already been sentenced Fudge," Malfoy somehow managed to convey both confusion and condescension in his tone.

"Well, it had been deemed that your sentence was too light and hence insufficient for your crimes," Fudge continued smugly.

"By who?" queried Malfoy.

Fudge did not answer him. He did not have the time to play twenty questions with the traitor. He backed away from the door slightly and turned toward the dementor.

"By my authority as the Minister of Magic, I order you to administer the Dementor's Kiss on this man," Fudge proclaimed coldly.

The dementor paused for barely a moment before it immediately swooped inside the cell. Nothing enticed a dementor more that the prospect of a soul to consume. Malfoy did not even have the time to voice his disbelief and horror before the creature was on him. Fudge watched in cold satisfaction as the creature subdued the wildly flailing wizard, it aura of despair strengthening considerably as a sign of its excitement, noticeable even through his patronus's aura. The dementor shortly overcame Malfoy and placed its mouth on top of his. It was over in a few seconds. It was not the first time Fudge had seen a person be kissed by a dementor, but no matter how many times he had seen it, it had never failed to send a chill through his spine.

He suppressed a shudder as he looked at Malfoy's unmoving but still living body and turned toward the dementor.

"Gather the rest of your brethren. You are going to have a feast tonight," Fudge told the dementor.

It took Fudge more than an hour to direct the dementors into administering the kiss on all the remaining Death Eaters. After which he had the dementors tie the Death Eaters' still living bodies to rocks and dump them in cold sea a short distance away from the island. Luckily he had not been interrupted in his work by the two human guards still remaining on the island. They had probably drunk themselves to sleep by now. Fudge did not blame then. If he had to stay on this cold dreary island for as long as they did, he would have done the same. He had originally appointed an entire score of MLE personnel to guard the prison after the dementors started leaving the island. But today they had all been called back to man other critical areas while their colleagues conducted raids on other Death Eaters. That was very convenient for Fudge as he had no doubt that most of them would try to stop him from doing what he just accomplished. He had singlehandedly eliminated two dozen dark wizards and struck a massive blow to you-know-who. He knew that no one else at the ministry would have the guts to do what he just did. The people of wizarding Britain would see and acknowledge that.

He knew that neither Bones nor Scrimgeour would have allowed him to execute the prisoners, so he didn't inform them of this part of his plan. He had drafted another decree after the meeting he had with them. This specific decree mandated a dementor's kiss and then execution for any one proved to be willingly supporting you-know-who. He knew that dementor's kiss and execution was redundant. But he wanted send the Death Eaters a message, just like the hanging, drawing and quartering of muggle criminals a few centuries ago.

He finished his work for the day and apparated to Umbridge's home. He had to go over his schedule for tomorrow, after which he would go to his own home and take a long nap. He needed a good amount of rest to deal with the shit storm he would face tomorrow.

* * *

Harry apparated into the garden of Dolores Umbridge's house. He gleaned the location of the house from Umbridge's mind via legilimency. The house was large, old and a comfortable distance away from any other muggle dwelling, probably part of an inheritance from her family. He had ordered Umbridge to remove any anti apparition enchantments in anticipation of his arrival.

He entered the house through the front door which was left unlocked, once again according to his commands. He had already learned the floor plan of the house from Umbridge's mind. So it did not take him long to find her sitting in the drawing room along with Fudge, next to her fireplace, awaiting his arrival. He had noticed that all the portraits in the house had been charmed inactive. Fortunately, Umbridge did not own a house elf, or things would have been a lot more difficult for him. He had come to learn through copious personal experience that house elves are not to be underestimated. They were powerful and also fiercely loyal, even to abusive masters. His task would have been a lot more difficult if he had to contend with one of those little buggers, especially since he had no intention of killing or harming them for their masters' sins.

"Hello Dolores,... Cornelius," He extended a greeting, startling them slightly.

"Have completed the plan Cornelius?" Harry asked, speaking with Fudge directly for the first time that day.

"Yes, all of them had been punished for their treachery," answered Fudge in a slightly robotic monotone. By now, both Fudge and Umbridge had fallen so deeply under his control that they kill themselves if he had ordered them to do so. But he had slightly twisted end in mind for them.

"Floo Selwyn and invite him to your house. Tell him that it is urgent. Convince him to come here now," He ordered Umbridge.

He watched Umbridge proceed to follow his instructions without the slightest bit of hesitation. The Imperius seemed to have settled in well. Even the tiny bit of resistance she had shown before completely vanished. Harry walked to a shaded spot beside the large fireplace and waited for Umbridge to lure his latest quarry into the trap. By now Fudge had stood up and walked to another spot on the other side of the fireplace. Harry found it very draining to control two people at the same time after all the magic he performed today. He was still not used performing so much heavy duty magic continuously. It would take a long time of hard practice before he would be anywhere near the level he wanted to be at.

Umbridge spent barely a minute with her head stuffed inside the fire place before she pulled it out and stepped back. The green flame create by the floo powder flickered to the more common orange for barely a moment before they flared green again and a dark cloaked wizard stumbled out of the fireplace. Selwyn was a tall, heavyset and thuggish looking wizard.

Harry did not give him any time, the beam of his non verbal stunning spell ploughed into the wizard's side. Selwyn collapsed like a sack. At the same time Fudge pointed his wand at Umbridge and cast the stunning spell and she too collapsed backward. Harry had no more need for her.

Harry searched Selwyn's robes and removed his wand before he pointed his own wand at the unconscious wizard once more.

"_Ennervate"_ Harry intoned lightly, acknowledging his tiredness and forsaking non verbal magic.

A wispy blue light struck the Death Eater and roused him from unconsciousness.

"_Imperio"_ Another invisible stream of magic struck the still drowsy and confused wizard and Harry again asserted his will on another wizard.

"Get up," The Death Eater followed Harry's command.

Harry walked up to his newest thrall and whispered a few commands in his ear and then returned his wand. He stepped back and withdrew his arm back under the invisibility cloak.

"_Ennervate"_ The black haired Death Eater turned to his much shorter cousin and incanted. The counter spell struck Umbridge and awakened her.

"What...? Selwyn...?" Having spent most of the day under a powerful Imperius and then being stunned abruptly didn't do her mental state any favours. So she was obviously quite confused and delirious.

"_Avada Kedavra"_ Selwyn incanted and a familiar green jet of light eliminated any thoughts, confused or otherwise, from the vile woman's mind with a resounding finality.

Umbridge's death broke the freezing charms she had placed on the portraits in her house and immediately upon seeing Selwyn standing over her corpse they started raising a ruckus. Selwyn, still firmly under the influence of Harry's imperius curse, reapplied the freezing charms on all the portraits again and also gave each of the annoying relics a good look at his face.

Selwyn then turned his wand onto Fudge and intoned the killing curse for the second time that night. Fudge, firmly under the control of Harry's imperius, only flinched before he too left the world of the living in a flash of unearthly green light.

Harry tapped his wand on Selwyn's arm and he muttered a long incantation. Selwyn was covered in a teal glow for a moment as Harry placed an anti-disapparition jinx on the Death Eater. The jinx was an extra precaution, just in case the Death Eater managed to break his imperius curse while executing his last command.

Harry once again stepped close to the tall Death Eater and whispered in his ear.

"Count to hundred in your mind and then cast the Fienfyre curse on Fudge and Umbridge's corpses,"

Harry then walked out as far as he could while still maintaining visual contact with Selwyn and waited there for him to finish the job.

Barely a few seconds passed before the Death Eater waved his wand in an intricate pattern and then jabbed it towards the ground, pointing at one of the corpses. A thin stream of dark orange flame shot out of the Death Eater's wand and twisted sinuously in the air like a snake trying to escape an invisible captor before it suddenly shot out towards Fudge's corpse. The cursed fire swallowed the entire body before a tongue of flame leapt onto Selwyn's dark robes and set them ablaze.

The Death Eater flailed around for a few moments before he too was completely consumed and his screams were abruptly cut off. He died before he even had the time to break the imperius curse. Just like before , the death of the caster broke the freezing charms on the portraits and their screams added to the noise created by the blaze. Within a few moments the fire grew to monstrous proportions and spread to the entire room. Harry swiftly walked out of the house and back to the apparition point. He waited for a few more minutes and watched the seemingly sentient flame consume the entire house before he apparated back to his secluded spot in Privet Drive and snuck up to his room. He once again divested himself of his disguise and stuffed his cloak and robes back in his trunk.

Harry Potter sank back onto his bed, his heart pounding with an odd mixture of satisfaction and dread. He had just struck a major blow to Voldemort and also took revenge on Fudge and Umbridge. He should be feeling happy, but the only positive feeling he could muster was the slight satisfaction at successfully executing what was until this morning only a really vague plan.

Maybe that was good. After all, only psychopaths feel happy after engineering the cold blooded murder of twenty seven people, no matter how much all of them deserved it. He had to kill both Fudge and Umbridge because imperius curse was extremely unreliable over a long term, no matter how skilled the caster was and he could not take the chance of someone discovering it. The Fiendfyre was a nice touch because it consumes everything leaving only ash behind. Even if any portrait in Umbridge's house had a connecting portrait in another dwelling, it would only help Harry as they had only seen and heard Selwyn, whom they would definitely recognise, what with him being Umbridge's cousin.

This one blow would set back Voldemort a lot. Most of the Death Eaters he had Fudge execute were very important to Voldemort, some because of their skill with a wand and others because of their positions in the ministry. Not only would he have to recruit new people and train them up, he had to also find new followers to within the ministry, both of which would take a long time. And pureblood wizards who would follow Voldemort's brand of bigotry were not available in abundance either. Looking at some of the Death Eaters Harry had faced, Voldemort already seemed to be scraping the bottom of the barrel. This would force him either recruit more from the younger generation of wizards, who would no doubt need a lot of training before they would be up to their predecessors' level of skill, or branch out to foreign countries, which comes with its own problems.

Any British wizard would agree that Voldemort was the most terrible Dark Lord in several centuries, but that wasn't completely true. Grindelwald and his followers easily trumped Voldemort and his Death Eater's by a few orders of magnitude in terms of the sheer body count and property damage they racked up. Granted Voldemort was definitely more magically powerful and crueller than Grindelwald ever was and he also had much fewer qualms about committing atrocities than Grindelwald. The only things holding back Voldemort were his own instability and a determined foe in the form of Dumbledore. In contrast Grindelwald had an almost uncontested run during the first few decades of his conquest.

This Grindelwald effect had made most of the continental European countries very wary of any Dark Wizards seeking to gather followers and they were quick to stamp out quite a few wizards who tried. Voldemort was a lot more powerful than any of those wannabe Dark Lord, but even he would face significant opposition from the various highly prickly ministries. This was the main reason why Voldemort spent so many years trying to take over the British ministry. He wanted the full power and authority of the ministry of magic behind him before he started to spread his tentacles into other countries.

Harry's actions would definitely throw a monkey wrench into a lot of plans. Voldemort would be forced to go back to the tactics he had used during the early years of his rise when he had only a few followers. He would be forced to buckle down and make his moves slowly and cautiously. This would in turn limit the options of both Dumbledore and the ministry in how they would fight against Voldemort. Harry had, with a single blow, slowed the pace of the war and bought himself more time to increase his skills.

He just had to keep his head down and let the immediate aftermath of his actions blow away. The second decree he had Fudge draft would definitely explain the demise of all the Death Eaters to the ministry. But the fact that Fudge died immediately after ordering the executions of so many Death Eaters would raise a lot of suspicions, especially since it was so unlike Fudge, who was an opportunistic coward. He knew damn well that a lot of people would suspect the imperius curse. Harry's intention of creating a patsy in Selwyn was not to convince the authorities themselves, but to provide them a convenient excuse to use.

Bones and Scrimgeour would portray the execution as the desperate actions of a cornered politician. They would find the relation between Selwyn and Umbridge and make up their own theories as to what actually happened in Umbridge's home. They would ultimately spin a story which was most convenient for them and feed it to the public, because even rumours that there could be another unknown party who could be using powerful dark magic to ruthless effect would cause chaos and spread fear. Dumbledore would go along with a cover up because he would not want anyone being distracted from fighting Voldemort and Voldemort himself would probably suspect Dumbledore even if it was not Dumbledore's usual modus operandi.

Voldemort knew how ruthless Dumbledore could be and he also knew that Dumbledore was growing older and hence weaker. Apart from Dumbledore, he would also suspect other outspoken and ruthless opponents in the ministry itself. But he would probably not speak out because any information he could gain would not be worth the fear it would cause among his remaining followers and hence hinder his recruitment efforts.

A lot of powerful and intelligent people would scramble to use the cover up he had so conveniently provided them. But they would also continue searching in the shadows for the real culprit. That is why Harry had to remain very careful. Harry had the motive, but as far as any of them knew, he definitely did not have the skill, the knowledge or the mindset to orchestrate the massacre. So Harry had to be very careful not display to his sudden leap in skill or his remarkably different mindset.

All of this meant that Harry had to act as if he had not undergone any drastic changes, which would be a pain in the arse but unfortunately very necessary. Harry drifted off to sleep pondering that slightly unhappy thought.

**Author's Note:**

**Firstly, I must apologize for the dreadfully long time I took to complete this chapter. I could give a lot of excuses (most of them real) but it would not mean much to any of you. So I hope this whopper of a chapter would make up for my tardiness.**

**I know Harry might come off as a little too powerful in this chapter, but worry not. Every action would have a reaction and Harry's slam dunk would create quite a few problems for him in the future as not everyone would react as he expected them to.**

**Already, his plan for clearing the path for Bones to become the minister was a goner. It seems Scrimgeour is destined to become the minister and being a paranoid ass, he would definitely annoy Harry a lot.**

**I have already started the next chapter and you can expect it in two or three weeks. Expect that one to be just as large as this one.**

**Cheers,**

**Sattilallu**


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